For every company that ever dreamed of being able to talk directly to its customers, Toyota (TM) has found an answer.
It announced Wednesday that new Lexus vehicles will start being delivered later this year with a system that includes capability for voice messages sent directly from the automaker to its drivers.
Called Lexus Insider, the service will let Lexus send audio messages to participating owners on whatever subject it chooses, from tips on making the best use of the vehicles' features to suggestions for a scenic drive.
Toyota officials promise to be discerning and restrained.
"We're not going to barrage customers with marketing messages," vows Jon Bucci, vice president of Toyota's U.S. advanced technology unit.
#4
True, Blondie - but they won't wait in line all night as people did for Reagan.
For instance, I personally will take the MSM's word for it. I'll know they're telling the truth because they'll be crying and rending their garments, just as anyone does when their beloved dies.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
01/08/2009 18:22
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#5
Carter writes: And this fragile truce was partially broken on Nov. 4, when Israel launched an attack in Gaza to destroy a defensive tunnel being dug by Hamas inside the wall that encloses Gaza.
WTF is a defensive tunnel? His bias is not even thinly veiled.
#9
Jimmah is the gift that keeps on giving... like a case of genital herpes, we just never really git rid of him.
why isn't he dead? i think he is clinging tenaciously to life so he can see Big Zero give a performance in the oval office that will make jimmy look mildly competent.
Posted by: Abu do you love ||
01/08/2009 21:18
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#10
In the photo op at the White House luncheon with the five living presidents, Jimmuh wouldn't even stand next to the others, even Clinton. Obama and Bush share a laugh, but Carter has a disgusted smirk. How did he ever get elected in the first place?
#11
700 trucks daily and the Palestinians are undernourished because Israel imprisons them and the world doesn't care? Well, I don't care other than my tax dollars go to support this lunacy. Geesh, Carter needs put out of his misery.
100% spot on rant on what is wrong in the ivory towers of the left. Go read it, you will be glad you did.
Posted by: Abu do you love ||
01/08/2009
16:37 ||
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#1
Abu is correct, so for those who don't have the time to go read, I have excerpted below:
The needs of the group must supercede, dontcha know.
Im pissed off that everyone seems okay on having to press one for English.
Im pissed that my sweet well-wishing friends and acquaintances now say Happy Holidays instead of Merry Christmas.
Can we all stop taking ourselves so damn seriously for half a minute?
Im pissed that I study the political issues of the day, educate myself, stay informed daily by a multitude of news sources from all slants and yet, come election day, my informed vote is cancelled by some numbskull who votes for the nicest smile, who doesnt know who the current vice-president is, or which party controls Congress, and whats more, doesnt care.
Im pissed off by how soft many in our nation have become. How whimpy the tone, how spineless the resolve. What happened to that brutally real notion that people should be held responsible for his or her actions?
when did destitution become a virtue? When did begging become a noble venture? When, dear friends, did panhandling become a lucrative industry? FTS!
Who can identify virtue, when there is no shame?
When are we going to admit that there is an evil movement out there dedicated to our destruction.
Youre not on your knees worshiping their boy Allah, so for this you and everyone like you all over the world must die and die now. But wait, its a religion of peace.
Were the good guys. Were not imperialists, or else we wouldve nuked the oil countries into radioactive dust, then moved in and taken the oil. Were the good guys. Only an entrenched self-loathing hatred of America will prevent you from seeing that.
Code word was "Light the Fire"
Lashkar-e-Tayyaba commander Zarar Shah has admitted under interrogation in Pakistan that he used telephone to handle the gunmen who carried out terrorist attacks in Mumbai last month, a Sunday Times report said, adding the attack began with the direction: 'Aag lagao!' (Light the fire!). "Controllers in Pakistan watched live television and warned the gunmen of the arrival of Indian commandoes, according to evidence amassed by the FBI and handed over to the Pakistani government,"
The controllers repeatedly told the attackers: "Aag lagao!", and during the conversation, the men were also instructed to kill all the Israelis who were held captive in the Jewish hostel but to spare all the Muslims, according to the Sunday Times report. Without quoting anyone, the newspaper claimed Shah had revealed that the 10 assailants were trained in Azad Kashmir and then travelled by boat from Karachi to Mumbai. "He implicated several other Lashkar men," it added. "He is singing,"
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
01/08/2009
15:29 ||
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#1
"we are simple, but well-armed farmers Jim Morrison fans. Behold, the Lizard King!"
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/08/2009 18:14
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#2
THE DOORS?
"Aag Lagao" > song "KEY LARGO" [Bogey abd Bacall]?
Chancellor Alistair Darling has denied he is planning to "print money" in an effort to tackle the downturn.
On Wednesday, he told the Financial Times newspaper he was considering a policy of "quantitative easing" to increase money supply to the economy. He has now said he is looking at "a range of measures," but "nobody is talking about printing money".
Shadow Chancellor George Osborne said any such move would be "the last resort of a desperate government".
According to the BBC's economics editor Hugh Pym, the Treasury could resort to the use of quantitative easing as falling interest rates become less effective at stimulating the economy. Instead of literally printing money, the Bank of England would write out cheques to banks in exchange for assets such as corporate investments. The hope would be that the banks would then lend this extra money to consumers who would in turn go out and spend it.
The government could also borrow more from the Bank of England and then use this money to invest in the economy via spending or tax cuts.
However boosting money supply like this effectively creates inflation - normally avoided by the government, but in seen as a necessary evil in tough economic times, our correspondent said.
#2
If the banks are sound, there's no need to give them money. Even if they have a zillion dollars in cash on their books, they won't lend it unless there's something to loend it on. and that's where the guvmint comes in.
Posted by: Mike N. ||
01/08/2009 19:43
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The United Nations Security Council is expected to approve a newly revised resolution calling for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza that calls for an international force to prevent arms smuggling.
The resolution also for the first time mentions Hamas by name, which along with the smuggling clause is a key United States demand....
The Egyptian-French proposal regarding the Rafah area- we don['t know the details of the proposal
aims to achieve a lasting halt to both rocket fire into Israel and to arms-trafficking for Hamas and a pullout of Israeli troops, French Foreign Ministry spokesman Eric Chevallier said Thursday.
#8
No, they want to make sure the end state is one where there is an international force backstopping the egyptians, maybe even Fatah back at the Rafah crossing, and they want to use the Israeli ops continuation as leverage to get that.
The "Islamic World" doesnt exist wrt to this issue. There is the Anti-Iran block (PA, Egypt, KSA,Jordan) Iran, Syria, and the spectators all other muslim countries. The first three players all have different agendas, and the latter group is saying just enought to assuage their street.
#11
actually UN binding resolutions DO matter, they were factors in the timing of the end of the '67 and '73 wars and the 2006 Lebanon op. Israel can laugh off a GA resolution, but not a UNSC res backed by the US. Egypt too.
Now Hamas wont follow a res necessarily, but its not clear how much Hamas is even going to be a player diplomatically. More important is the extent to which res puts pressure on the Euros and Arabs to supply peacekeeping/bordercrossing forces for Gaza.
#13
that calls for an international force to prevent arms smuggling
An international "force" that comes complete with magic blue helmets to put the fear of Allan in Hamass?
It's all pointless.
Unless, of course, the "binding" UN resolution includes a sunset clause that goes into effect the instant:
1) The first rocket gets fired from the area the "Palestinians" are squatting in;
2) the "Palestinians" try to rearm, build another missile, or get involved with any other terror weapons including bombs, militants or terrorists (and no, they don't need an army or anything like it);
3) The "Palestinians" break ground on another one of their tunnelling projects;
4) The incitement starts up, including that fuc&ing rabbit or anything like it;
5) Anything else happens that would make the "Palestians" a useful tool for Iran;
6) Hamass or Fatass start throwing each other off buildings;
7) Nasrallah's spittle hits the camera lens;
8) Try to engage in any activities whose main purpose is to subvert a peace process.
Actually, I don't know why I went past condition number one. Just venting, I guess.
#14
You go to war with the army you have not the army you want. You deal with the UN you have not the UN you want. Yes the UN sucks and is probably a net negative to human civilization but then again lots of things are like that.
If the Israelis are smart they will demand lots of UN observers at Sederot and the other southern cities and towns.
They should also make sure, if possible, that the UN international force has some anti Arab muslims, like Turks and Kurds. The time between this resolution and the immediate cease fire resolution can be used for that.
#18
Great, UN observers, cuz UNIFIL worked oh-so-well.
Bush is in a tight spot here. If he vetoes anything that comes along, that leaves the resolution to Barry. If he doesn't trust Barry, he has no choice but to ink up on the best thing he can.
Posted by: Mike N. ||
01/08/2009 19:54
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#19
Resolution was just passed. Don't have language yet.
Good for Shrum for championing Israel's right to defend itself against the Hamas rocket barrage. He is correct, too, that lasting peace will come only when the Palestinians abandon their hope that Israel can somehow be defeated or destroyed.
Unfortunately, Shrum represents an increasingly minority point of view within the Democratic Party. A Rasmussen poll conducted in the last week of 2008 found that while 62 percent of Republicans backed Israel's action in Gaza, only 31 percent of Democrats did. Almost three-quarters of Republicans blamed Hamas for starting this war; only a minority of Democrats agreed. Republicans are 20 points more friendly toward Israel than Democrats. And while extreme hostility to Israel does not exist among Republicans, almost one in 10 Democrats describes Israel as an "enemy of the United States."
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Posted by: Steve White ||
01/08/2009
14:06 ||
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#1
Yet it is also true that Obama comes to office with the most opaque record on Israel of any new president
The guy sat in a church for 20 years that was shockingly anti-semitic. I guess that wasn't worthy of mention in this article.
#2
Can we please stop using website comments as meaningful indicators of the opinion of site owners?
And yes, the hostility to Israel among the Left is a concern for the Dem party. So? Obama won election dissing Hamas. His new Sec of State is the woman who made a point of being more proIsrael than obama. The new NSA is pro-arab, but his ties are all with Fatah, not Hamas. The Secdef is the same.
The proof of the pudding is in the eating of course. I can certainly understand Baraks desire to move before Jan 20. On several different grounds. But lets judge the president elect on what he says and does (even if that means waiting till he takes office) not on arcana like this.
#3
OTOH, WAFF > GLOBALRESEARCH.CA - WAR AND NATURAL GAS: THE ISRAELI INVASION AND GAZA'S OFFSHORE GAS FIELDS [UK BritGas-Israeli conspiracy agz Paleos]???
* PAKISTANI DEFENCE FORUM > PAKISTANI ISI AGENCY PALNS "ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF PAKISTAN" INSIDE INDIA BY 2020!?; + INDIA'S RAW AGENCY: DESTABILIZING SOUTH ASIA?, + THE NEW ISLAMIC EMPIRE FROM TURKEY TO PAKISTAN + INDIA AS PART OF THE GREATER WEST [or Greater Islamic Empire]?
SAME > PAKISTAN RECEIVED 120 C-602/YJ-62 CEUISE MISSLES FROM CHINA.
* WORLD MIL FORUM > INDIA: ONLY INDIA'S COMMUNIST PARTY [Kerala] FIGHTS INTERNAL CORRUPTION. Current strengths and probs of WORLD'S LARGEST ACTIVE MARXIST-COMMUNIST PARTY + SUB-ORGS.
#5
And yes, the hostility to Israel among the Left is a concern for the Dem party. So?
lol! Do the stats in this article upset you? They should. You are aligned with a party that will turn on you in a dime. Yet you stay with them because that Republican Right is just soooo evil. It sux to get a clue, doesn't it?
Sure, we can all put our desires on the blank slate that is Obama. Why not? Hope is what the man ran on. And maybe he does not share the views from those of his Pastor who was his family's mentor for so many years. I think we all agree that is a change we can hope for.
#1
"suspending operations after an Israeli tank shell hit one of its convoys during the ceasefire period, creating secondary explosions, unfortunately killing two drivers."
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
01/08/2009 16:29
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Fitch Ratings has warned that Britain's public debt will explode to almost 70pc of GDP by the end of next year, vaulting past Germany to become one of the most heavily-indebted states in the industrial world.
There are fears that the next crisis in the global financial system could prove to be a rebellion by the bond vigilantes, already worried by talk of a bond bubble. This would push up rates used to fixed mortgages and corporate bond deals. Central banks can offset this for a while by purchasing bonds directly -- "printing money" -- but not indefinitely.
The US alone is expected to issue $2 trillion (£1.3 trillion) of debt this year, and the Europeans are not far behind. Italy alone must tap the markets for 200bn as it rolls over its huge stock of public debt and meets the cost or recession. Fitch Ratings said Ireland, Greece, the Netherlands, and France face a heavy calendar of auctions as maturities fall due.
Robert Stheeman, the DMO's chief, says Britain may be nearing the limits of investor tolerance. "I'm not predicting that we will have a failed auction, but I can't rule that out. It's a big amount of debt to be sold. We are in a different world from a year ago," he told Bloomberg News.
As long as Britain keeps its coveted `AAA' rating it should be able to the tap the bond markets at a reasonable price, but this rating is no longer entirely secure. Fitch says the UK will have jumped from 44pc of GDP in 2007 to 68pc by late 2010, a staggering rise for major country. It usually takes a war to do such damage.
The death of Father Neuhaus is a terrible blow. Not for him, who is now united with his Savior and his Redeemer, in whom Father Neuhaus placed all of his trust and all of his hope; but for us, who have lost one of America's leading public intellectuals, a man of profound wisdom and learning, and a great champion for the unborn. It was Father Neuhaus, along with his dear, long-time friend George Weigel and just a handful of others like Michael Novak, who not only championed the pro-life cause for so many years, but who gave the rest of us both the grounding and the vocabulary to speak on this issue. . . .
Father Neuhaus was author of one of the most important, debate-changing books in the history of modern conservatism: The Naked Public Square: Religion and Democracy in America (published in 1984). He penned many other books, before and after, and they were unfailingly intelligent, well-argued, elegantly written, and often moving. He was editor in chief of First Things and author of its very popular column "The Public Square," Neuhaus's monthly survey of religion, culture, and public life. And he was a central figure in finding common ground among Catholics and evangelicals. Father Neuhaus's influence was quiet, profound, and virtually without boundaries. A former, very influential member of Congress wrote me just yesterday, saying, "When I first ran for Congress I read everything I could from him to formulate my thinking on social policy."
More than a thousand Afghans signed up on Thursday to say they wanted to go and fight Israel in the Gaza Strip, many of them blaming the United States which has some 30,000 troops in Afghanistan, for supporting the Jewish state. Scores of young men crowded into the library of Kabul's Milad ul-Nabi mosque, lined with banners reading "Death to Israel" and "Death to America", to sign up to fight Israel.
"More than a thousand brave Afghans registered their names here to fight Israeli troops in Gaza," said Habibullah Assam, the imam of the mosque and organiser of the campaign. "Several hundred Afghans, including doctors and teachers, have also volunteered to give blood to help the miserable people of Palestine," he said.
"The acts of Israel against the innocent Muslims of Gaza are barbaric and inhumane and widely helped by the Americans," Assam said, adding that nearly 10,000 people across Afghanistan had so far volunteered to fight in Gaza.
One Afghan at the mosque said he fought in Chechnya in the 1990s after being trained by the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba Islamist militant group which India says is behind the Mumbai attacks. "I have the military training and I will do whatever possible to go to Gaza to at least fire one bullet towards Israel," Mohammad Ayaas said. "I will be the luckiest person to die beside my Muslim brothers fighting for an honourable cause."
The 13-day Israeli operation against Hamas in Gaza led to protests in Afghanistan last week. While reaching Gaza from Afghanistan is all-but impossible, many of the volunteers said they would take revenge on U.S. troops inside Afghanistan instead.
"Infidels are killing Muslims everyday and the United States is saying Israel's offensive is just," said Mohammad Akram, a shopkeeper. "If we can't reach Gaza, we should seek revenge on Israel's allies in our own country like the Taliban do."
#1
Scores of young men crowded into the library of Kabul's Milad ul-Nabi mosque, lined with banners reading "Death to Israel" and "Death to America", to sign up to fight Israel.
Suuuuuure ya will, boys.
So why not fight the Americans? I mean, it'll save you a bus ticket, seeing how they're probably right down the street. Could it be because you're the typical crew of Brave Jihadi Pussies?
High-Profile Doctor in Gaza Called an 'Apologist for Hamas'
By Jennifer Lawinski (Fox)
A high-profile Norwegian doctor who has said the September 11 terrorists were justified in their attack is now treating patients in Gaza and is being accused of presenting "hard-core propaganda" to TV interviewers in his telling of the conflict between Hamas and Israel.
Dr. Mads Gilbert has become an unofficial advocate of the Palestinian cause, his critics say.
The only word I quibble with is 'unofficial' ...
International media reports, including those from the BBC, CBS, CNN and FOX's sister station Sky News, present Gilbert as an ordinary doctor. But a look at his record shows that Gilbert, 61, is a political activist and member of the Norwegian Maoist "Red" party, and he has been involved in solidarity work for the Palestinians since the 1970s. He has criticized the international aid organization Doctors Without Borders for refusing to take sides in conflicts.
Gilbert volunteers at the Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza with the Norwegian Aid Committee (NORWAC), an aid organization funded by the Norwegian government, and he has been interviewed by the media on a variety of issues. Israeli government officials have said Hamas hides weapons in the hospital where Gilbert works.
NGO Monitor, an Israeli human rights watchdog group, says Gilbert presents one-sided criticism of Israel to the media and has accused Israel of deliberately targeting civilians in its Gaza offensive to stop Hamas from firing rockets into Israel.
In addition to being supportive of the terrorist organization Hamas, Gilbert has voiced support for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. "The attack on New York did not come as a surprise after the policy that the West has led during the last decades," Gilbert told the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet on Sept. 30, 2001. "The oppressed also have a moral right to attack the USA with any weapon they can come up with."
When asked if he supported a terror attack on the U.S., Gilbert said, "Terror is a bad weapon but the answer is yes within the context which I have mentioned."
Gerald Steinberg, executive director of NGO Monitor, said Gilbert's characterization of the situation in Gaza is "in the form of incitement of hatred."
"We question the accuracy and the political biases if they exist by groups that claim to promote human rights, humanitarian and non-political goals," Steinberg told FOXNews.com. "A doctor is someone who is not supposed to take a political side."
"We found out he justified the 9/11 attacks.⊠Here's a guy with a radical political background who is being interviewed as if he were a neutral medical observer," Steinberg said. "He has become an apologist for Hamas, totally violating his obligation as a physician to heal the sick and not contribute to violence."
A representative for Sky News said it has not presented a biased picture of the conflict in Gaza when interviewing Gilbert. "We are reporting events as they happen and interviewing all of the protagonists and a wide range of commentators on the situation," the network said in a statement.
"Dr. Gilbert is a working doctor in Gaza interviewed by the international news agencies in Gaza. A short interview clip with him has been included in one of our reports. Sky News has consistently reported on the Hamas rocket attacks into Israel, given extensive context and background to the dispute and interviewed the Israeli President live on air for 15 minutes."
The BBC did not respond to a request for comment.
Gilbert told FOXNews.com that he is neither anti-Israeli nor anti-American. "I did my Ph.D. research in the United States at the University of Iowa in Iowa City," Gilbert said. "I have hundreds of American friends and I have many, many Jewish friends.
"I have nothing against the people of Israel. I have nothing against the Jews. In fact, I think that one of the worst things that happened in history was the Holocaust."
But Gilbert said he and NORWAC do not hide their pro-Palestinian bias in the Hamas-Israel conflict. "We support the Palestinian people, and that's absolutely no secret that we have been supporting the Palestinian people for many years," Gilbert said. "We have been working tirelessly to improve the medical conditions through systematic training and teaching....
"I do not support the wall on the West Bank and I do not support the siege of Gaza," he said. "This is very simple. If that is biased, so be it. Call me biased."
Steinberg said Gilbert's partisanship violates his ethical code. "By justifying terror, supporting Hamas and fueling the conflict, NORWAC and Mads Gilbert have violated the Hippocratic Oath 'first, do no harm'," he said.
The Hippocratic Oath states: "In every house where I come I will enter only for the good of my patients, keeping myself far from all intentional ill-doing."
But George Annas, a professor of medical ethics at The School of Public Health at Boston University, said Gilbert's political stance does not violate ethical codes. "I think its fine for doctors to have political affiliations as long as they make them known. It really doesn't get to be a medical ethics issue unless you get some patients involved," Annas said.
Problems might arise, Annas said, "if he has wounded and sick patients and has been taking time away to do interviews and people are dying."
#2
Nobody has ever explained to me what the argument is against the wall. West bank can certainly get food in from the Jordan side so the only thing the wall does is keep the Pals from killing Jews. So unless i hear otherwise I always equate those opposed to the wall wtih saying the Jews are not allowed to defend themselves even in non-violent ways.
#3
Sounds like the doc needs to make the acquaintance of an axehandle - right across the top of both hands. Being a useful idiot is one thing - being an active part of the problem is another.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
01/08/2009 15:14
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#5
During the first wave of the Black Plague across Europe which would kill off about a third of the population and during a period when 'modern' medicine was yet to understand its pathology, the Duke of Milan issued an edict that any household that was found to have a member with the plague that household would be sealed up with all it occupants. Cruel, yes. However, in the end it spared Milan the ravages and even greater death that visited elsewhere. Sometimes, walls are your only protection against the most vile threats known to man when other do not work.
#6
I would agree, P2K and I think history will judge Clinton harshly for the corruption involved in admitting China to the WTO and the devastation that has wrought. We will start to get out of this crisis when we leave the WTO and reconstitute our free trade block to include only democracies.
#7
Anyone saying something like this, that people should attack the US, needs to be put onto a list. This list should be given to a new Intel agency operating under enhanced WWII rules.
Then list will be issued to the wetworks department who will ensure that these people receive their rewards for their call for attacks against us. Publish the list to the UN, so that they know who will be executed during the coming months. If anyone complains, add their name to the list.
Since this is already stuff they accuse us of, I don't see how it can make things any worse and if people start dying for their desire to hurt us, things may just get better.
As always, my preference is for the US to use satellite beam weapons for this kind of thing, mostly microwaves. Especially good when these idiots are on TV and can be zapped publically.
#8
"As always, my preference is for the US to use satellite beam weapons for this kind of thing, mostly microwaves. Especially good when these idiots are on TV and can be zapped publically."
Me likee, SB. :-D
Make it so.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
01/08/2009 17:04
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#10
As per the MSM-Net, unless PEBO starts saying something to the contray, HE's NOT LOOKING LIKE A PRO-PEACE, PRO-MUSLIM, ANTI-BUSH "NEUTRALIST/MODERATE/CENTRIST", OR EVEN A [former]"GOOD MUSLIM".
Lest we fergit [old], USA > NEW 9-11 > IIRC A MAJOR NEW TERRORIST STRIKE(S) UTILIZ NUKES-WMDS, ESPEC "DIRTY NUKES". AGZ US CITIES OR OTHER HIGH-VALUE TARGETS IS POSSIBLE OR LIKELY BEFORE YEAR 2013.
At the rate PEBO is going vee Bush WOT policies > Jan 2009 - NLT 2010???
#11
D *** NG IT, I don't recall the Movie Title [again] but this artic reminds me of that old 1970's late nite made-for-TV movie about a AFRICAN-AMER/BLACK VPOTUS whom takes over as POTUS per se for his white predecessor.
WEIRD > ITS ONE OF THOSE FEW FLICKS WHOSE TITLES I JUST CAN'T REMEMBER NO MATTER WHAT I DO, BUT THE PLOT I DO VERY WELL.
The world-wide protests against Israel's ground incursion into Gaza are so full of hatred that they leave me with the terrible feeling that these protests have little to do with the so-called disproportionality of the Israeli response to Hamas rockets, or the resulting civilian casualties.
My fear is that the rage we see in the protesters marching in the streets is far more profound and dangerous than we would like to believe. There are a great many people in the world who, even after Auschwitz, just can't bear the Jewish state having the same rights they so readily grant to other nations. These voices insist Israel must take risks they would never dare ask of any other nation-state -- risks that threaten its very survival -- because they don't believe Israel should exist in the first place.
Just look at the spate of attacks this week on Jews and Jewish institutions around the world: a car ramming into a synagogue in France; a Chabad menorah and Jewish-owned shops sprayed with swastikas in Belgium; a banner at an Australian rally demanding "clean the earth from dirty Zionists!"; demonstrators in the Netherlands chanting "Gas the Jews"; and in Florida, protestors demanding Jews "Go back to the ovens!"
Continued on Page 49
Countercolumn News Ticker: Pr0n industry seeks Federal Bailout
(CNT)Stung by limp sales and sagging profits, the American pr0nography industry has fallen on hard times, and is seeking a $5 billion injection from Uncle Sam, according to CNN. Experts say that unless the Treasury moves quickly, the entire U.S. adult entertainment industry could go down quicker than a crack whore on a quota, say anal-ysts.
Jason's double entendres needed a wider audience. And I needed a good chuckle.
Citgo, the Venezuelan government's U.S.-based oil subsidiary, reversed course today and said it will continue shipments of heating oil to poor families in the United States.
Former U.S. Rep. Joseph Kennedy, head of the Boston-based nonprofit which distributes the fuel, said Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez intervened directly. I'd love to have been a tap on the line fly on the wall during that call.
Citgo Petroleum CEO Alejandro Granado made the announcement in Boston, saying Houston-based Citgo had found a way to continue paying for oil shipments. So who'd you steal the money from where'd you get the money all of a sudden?
"This is a big effort," Granado said. "This is a sacrifice." "But it ain't coming out of my pocket, so what do I care?"
The announcement came two days after Kennedy said Citgo was suspending fuel assistance, with the company citing falling oil prices and the world economic crisis.
Chavez provides fuel for 200,000 households in 23 states under a program that has come under fire in the U.S. Critics correctly say the program is a ploy by Chavez to undermine the Bush administration. Fear not. If Bambi doesn't sufficiently kiss Oogo's ass, he'll undermine that administration too. With the willing help of Bambi's friends, the Left.
Kennedy said the decision to continue oil shipments was made "with direct involvement of President Chavez." So who'd he steal the money from?
When asked if he'd personally spoken to Chavez, Kennedy, the son of former Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, said "I promised to continue helping Oogo undermine the U.S. Government, of course. Which I was going to do anyway." "I did what was necessary to keep this program going."
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
01/08/2009
12:40 ||
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#1
Well, good for Joe. He can keep his 400 grand a year job being a butt boy for Hugo.
Renowned cleric Youssef al-Qaradaoui, who happens to be a senior member of the Muslim Brotherhood, and the Muslim Brotherhood have called to turn Friday into a day of wrath and have asked that the traditional Friday prayer, the most important moment of the week for a pious Muslim, be followed by large demonstrations to express solidarity throughout the Muslim world.
Days of wrath that were ordered in the past for instance for the Mohamed cartoons crisis of 2006 have prompted large gatherings and serious troubles.
Throughout the world, including in Europe, Jewish communities will be specifically at risk, especially in the early afternoon. It is worth noting that several fatwas that call to kill Jews have been issued and passed on through online Arab media and jihadist websites. The latest comes from Algerian cleric Chamseddine Bourouba who wrote yesterday that any Jew is a legitimate target that can be struck by Muslims.
Interests of Western countries accused of supporting Israel could also be targeted throughout the Arab world.
#3
Let's make all of these fatwas declarations of war and therefore any one so targeted can shoot first. If Boobaloo says any Jew is a target than any Jew can also make HIM a target.
Create a standing prize pool. Whoever whacks Boobaloo or Qarawowee or Sadr or anyone else gets a $1,000,000.
#2
I don't know, betting against symmetry is counter intuitive to anyone with a physics background, even an undergraduate one. Our universe always seems to prove itself to be a wonderfully symmetric system.
#5
I always go with "extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof".
This sounds like another case of publishing before there is evidence. Have your theory, make your predictions, do your experiments.....have others replicate your work.....then we'll talk.
#6
There once was a racer named Fisk
Who took a considerable risk
When his dragster got traction
Lorentz-Fitzgerald contraction
Reduced his wazoo to a disc
Although the webserver file for the UAH dataset has not been updated yet, the man who is "in the know" because he's a major part of the process has released the December UAH global lower troposphere temperature anomaly value. It is 0.18°C down from .254°C the previous month the average for 2008 will be about .15C vs about .20C to .25C. for 2007 and 2006
Mr. Watt has a graph at the source. Also, he is in the running for the webawards this year (he is in the science category
#2
DRUDGE > NASA ASTRONAUTS IN DANGER FROM COSMIC RAYS DUE TO LESS ACTIVE SUN; + REDDIT > SCIENTISTS FEAR "SPACE FATRINA" STORM OF SOLAR RADIATION, for that kindler gentler SOLAR EXPANSION that can damage iff not destroy all human techs and civilization.
The conventional wisdom about the incursion by Israeli ground units into Gaza, mirrored in Sunday's Washington Post, is that "Israeli leaders run the risk of repeating their disastrous experience in the 2006 Lebanon war, when they suffered high casualties in ground combat with Hezbollah." Apparently, reporters and pundits are even more prone to refighting the last war than generals: Gaza is not Lebanon; Hamas is not Hezbollah and, most critically, Israel now is not Israel in 2006.
To begin with, the physical and geographical differences between southern Lebanon and the Gaza strip could hardly be greater. And while Hassan Nasrallah and the Hezbollah leadership were under air attack in the outskirts of Beirut in 2006, the Hamas leadership has far fewer places to hide in Gaza city and elsewhere in Gaza. The initial successes of the Israeli airstrikes were not just a product of much better intelligence about Hamas (though it's probable that Israeli intelligence had done a superior job of exploiting differences amongst Hamas and West Bank leaders to improve its targeting), but also reflect simple facts of proximity and smaller scale. The terrain makes perhaps an even greater difference in ground warfare. The hills of southern Lebanon are not only naturally defensible terrain--each village providing an excellent fortified fighting position--but helped to channel Israeli armored columns. A good percentage of Israeli combat deaths came from a handful of successful ambushes.
#2
Nuclear weapons are for threatening, not using. Actually using one in this day and age (even on Israel) would be beyond my comprehension. I don't know what would unfold, nuclear counter attack? UNSC sanctioned invasion? Hard to say, but it would be safe to say that if Iran had a nuke they could not shoot it at Israel for attacking Hamas.
Text deleted. This is way, way too long to post in full here, and none of the html and other codes that crept into the text were fixed before posting. I do NOT have time to fix posts here all day. AoS.
#3
As far as I know anyone can buy an annuity (defined benefit plan). I don't know why you'd need the govt. to do it for you. If you don't feel able to manage your own money you should find someone to do it for you. Of course, it will cost you a little, but not near as much as the govt. will take to do 1/5th as good a job.
#4
401(k) plans shift all retirement-planning risks -- not saving enough, making poor investment choices, outliving savings -- to untrained individuals
The third of these risks - outliving savings - will be addressed by a national health care program; after all, that problem can be solved by increasing investment value or not living as long.
And any conventional government plan is guaranteed to be a poor investment choice - better to just throw darts at the WSJ for your picks.
That leaves "not saving enough", but the government says we have to spend, spend, spend to stimulate the economy.
#5
Once again the govt just doesn't get. They do not know the problem they are truly trying to solve. If savings rates are the problem then why cap the savings each year. The cap should be on the total. They want rich people to spend and poor people to save and the middle class to pay for both. Let everyone save up to 1.5 - 2.0 million dollars with great tax advanatges to do so. Then force the money into trusted securites. The govt should be encouraging wealth building not Ponzi schemes.
#6
The problem, airandee, is the government does not want you to create wealth. They want to take it from you and have you be dependent on them. You are much less likely to make a fuss if with one act the government can cut you off from all your sustenance. Communism 101.
#7
I learned many, many years ago that whatever the government pushes is to be avoided like the plague, NO 401K, NO IRA, NO government bonds, etc for them to steal,
Posted by: Rednek Jim ||
01/08/2009 16:57
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#8
Sorry, but if you haven't been paying attention, and don't want to grow up and deal with your money, TS.
Sometimes the purpose of your life is to serve as a warning to others, ya know?
But I wouldn't worry (too much) about the guvmint getting into our 401k's or other retirement plan for a while. Wait till the bills for all this "stimulation" come due, and all bets are off on that, though.
(Mojo, forget gold. They can still get their mitts on that. Cayman Islands, Bahamas, Panama....you get the idea. ;) )
#9
WORLD MIL FORUM > IIUC A COMMUNIST AMERIKA MAY EXPERIENCE A BETTER, LARGER "GREAT LEAP FORWARD" THAN CHINA EVER DID UNDER CHAIRMANS MAO OR DENG. SUCH AN AMERICAN "G-L-F" COULD PROVE TO BE A SCORPION FOR CHINA!?
Since the aerial attack on Gaza began, Hamas has sought to suppress individuals it believes endanger the group's fight against Israel and its hold on power in the Strip, as well as public morale. Prime targets include Fatah members, people convicted or suspected of collaborating with Israel, and "common" criminals. An opportunity to settle all family business...
"Hamas rules with an iron fist even now," said one resident. A political activist who says he supports neither Hamas nor Fatah said that given the difficult conditions created by the ongoing shelling and ground invasion, Hamas is likely to try to prevent collaborators or those suspected to be from working with Israel.
Since the operation began on December 27, Hamas operatives have executed several people it classified as collaborators. Members of the group have confirmed the executions took place, and said the victims had admitted giving information to the Shin Bet security service that resulted in the deaths of Palestinians, or had already been sentenced to death by a Palestinian military court but the sentences were delayed for various reasons.
Independent sources said that among the dead were those not known publicly to have been collaborators, as well as others long suspected of cooperation with Israel, or those arrested and later released.
Estimates of the number of suspects executed range from 40 to 80, but amid the prevailing conditions shelling, fear of walking the streets and media blackouts it is virtually impossible to verify the numbers or identities of the dead.
Executions are carried out secretly. In Rafah, for example, at least some of the victims were killed in a caravan erected in the area formerly occupied by the Rafiah Yam settlement, and the victims' relatives were invited to take away the bodies. "Wanna come down and pick up your husband, Mrs. Mahmoud?"
"Why? Did his car break down?"
"Not exactly..." "Should I bring a box?"
"Naw, a coffee can will do."
"The two-pound can?"
Even in the current conditions, Hamas is continuing to arrest those it suspects of criminal activity or Fatah membership, many of whom were arrested on the eve of the IDF operation and fled detention when the shelling began. No one knows where the detained are being held.
Independent sources and those linked with Fatah say Hamas' common methods include confiscating cell-phones, beatings, house arrest and firing at a suspect's legs. So, down the road, they can execute everybody with a limp.
Fatah members say Hamas is following a policy dictated from its leadership and directed against Fatah as a whole. An official in the Hamas-run Interior Ministry told Haaretz that the steps were taken only against Fatah members who expressed "happiness" at the aerial attack and even "distributed candy" in the streets as it began. An independent source corroborated Hamas' account. What's that in your pocket there, Mahmoud? A Milky Way?
Fatah officials said last Thursday that notifications were sent to organization members from the public security forces, under the direction of Hamas's Interior Minister Said Siyam, confining them to house arrest for 48 hours. Other Fatah members were ordered not to leave their homes from 7 P.M. until morning.
Hamas is also targeting common crime, promising the public that prices will not rise due to the closures of crossings into Gaza, nor will looting be allowed from stores that have been shelled. Unless they're doing it...
Phhhhew. I'll bet there's thousands of pseudo Jihadis that are breathing easier...
And their Moms. Don't forget all their sainted mothers...
Iran's top leader has banned hard-line Iranian volunteers from leaving the country to carry out suicide bombings against Israel.
Someone sent a message, did they ...
Iran's state television on Thursday quoted Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as saying that Iran can't allow volunteers to cross its border and take military action against Israel. But he said Iran won't spare any efforts to assist Hamas in other ways.
In other words...good luck, boys. Give em hell for us.
"Youse guys could always stage a sit-in! Or maybe take over an embassy!"
Hard-line Iranian student groups asked the government to authorize volunteers to go carry out suicide bombings in Israel in response to the IDF assault on the Gaza Strip.
Lemme at em! LEMME AT EM!!
"I want to moidalize 'em!"
"Finish yer education first, sonny."
"But I've memorized the Quran! And I can shoot-off a gun! What else do I need to learn?"
Iran is Hamas's main backer, though the country denies sending weapons to the Islamic terrorist movement.
"No, no, certainly not!"
Just good wishes and happy thoughts.
The volunteers staged a sit-in at Teheran's international Mehrabad airport this week, demanding they be sent to Gaza, the online Rooz agency reported.
Worked about as well as any other student sit-in around the world ...
The volunteers, numbering up to 200 people, belonged to an Iranian group, which issued an advertisement earlier this week offering a reward of $1 million to anyone who would assassinate Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
Betcha the Mad Mullahs would react different if someone offered a million to whack Short Round ...
#1
The Iranians finally realized that non-verbal provocations launched by the supreme leader constitute an act of war. Not that Israel is going to bomb Iran any less, mind you.
#3
"provocations launched by the supreme leader constitute an act of war"
I don't think Iran cares much about that.
What Iran REALLY cares about is being seen backing a loser. And Hamas is losing BIG.
Posted by: Minister of funny walks ||
01/08/2009 12:36
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#4
Believe it or not, a LOT of Iranian people love Americans and Israel more then the amount of people that wish for both of our destruction and would carry out such attacks. Seems to me the bluff didn't work IN Iran either.
#5
lftbhndagn, I believe it but how can the US help them remove their government? Any kind of prying tends to backfire and every year they have riots and seem to be waiting for something before everything collapses into status quo again.
#7
Imteresting - it forestalls Iran from giving Israel any excuse to attack and destroy its budding Nucprogs, while also indir fostering pro-Islamist, anti-US-Isr-Western destabilization in EGYPT, etal. as per the Israeli-HAMAS fight in Gaza. UNFORTUNATELY, THE PALEOS GET SHAFTED - AGAIN - BY THE GEOPOLITICS OF THEIR NEIGHBORING MUSLIMS. THERES ALWAYS SYRIA + NIGHTLY ROWBOATS.
#8
I don't think we'd be getting rose petals thrown at our feet if teh mullahs and thugocracy in Iran were smited. It's not the Arab/Persian way to show gratitude.
Typically, they ask: "why not faster, why so much collateral damage, when can you leave, support us with financial aid, don't expect oil favoritism, you bastards(!) you killed Abu Kenny!"
That said, most of Iran is educated and western-looking whether they acknowledge it or not. They'd do OK if the black turbans ate shrapnel. There would be "death to Juice!" rallies, but they'd eventually get over it
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/08/2009 19:31
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#9
UNFORTUNATELY, THE PALEOS GET SHAFTED
Funny how that happens over and over again. Do you suppose the Paleos will ever catch on that the entire Middle East is using them?
#10
The Iranians finally realized that non-verbal provocations launched by the supreme leader constitute an act of war
It is more like the Iranian government has no problem with the protests and the volunteering. That keeps the fools from remembering that they are for the most part jobless with no hope of employment soon.
The problem the Iranian government has with the fools is that most of them will never become shaheed. Either the Israelis will kill some of them, or they will linger in Gaza both disrespecting and being disrespected by the Palestinians and perhaps get a bit too fond of the hashish.
Eventually they will return to Iran, disillusioned and bitter. And that is what the Iranian government does not want to happen.
More and more these days, my [writer for the liberal New Republic] morning newspaper reads like an ensemble comedy of errors cast entirely with Democrats: Bill Richardson probed! Blago busted! Charlie Rangel investigated! Eliot Spitzer ruined! Kwame Kilpatrick jailed! Bill "Freezer" Jefferson indicted! ... and so on. Ugh.
It's excruciating to watch all these Democrats clomp around in clown shoes. But, at least for now, it won't matter! Briefly, here's why not:
-Most of the Democratic scandals have been on the state or local level.
-The Democratic scandals are not linked
-The Democratic scandals do not involve top party leadership
-People do not yet think the Democratic president sucks.
#1
"[C]omedy of errors" & "Democratic clowns" - i.e. it's kind of funny, maybe even cute. Boys will be boys after all.
"Don't Matter" - i.e. we're in charge, and the media has our back, so it doesn't matter what we do and you had better damn well get used to that.
"People do not yet think the Democratic president sucks." - I'm not people? 49% of the country who voted against him aren't people? And what about that pregnant "yet"...
#7
gromky, the national languages of Belgium are French and Flemish. Flemish is a dialect of Dutch, which the Netherlanders mock unmercifully -- whether fair or not, the Flems are viewed as ignorant peasants.
Rather than call for a special election in Illinois, Reid sends a letter to Blagojevich signed by everyone in the Democratic caucus asking him to step down. They assert that they will not seat anyone he appoints.
Harumph.
Blago wipes his ass with it and appoints Burris anyway.
Burris holds a press conference and announces he will be in D.C. on Tuesday to be sworn in with the rest of the Senate. Bobby Rush plays the race card. Reid does not see the handwriting on the wall.
He counters by calling Secretary of State Jesse White, who has already said he won't sign Burris's certification, and encourages him. What White is doing is most certainly outside his legal authority -- the Secretary of State doesn't have veto power. But Reid not only gives White a high five, he tells him they'll use this to keep Burris from being seated.
Then he smugly chortles about how he'll manipulate Senate procedure and punt to the Rules Committee, and assures everyone that they will drag things out for months if necessary until Blago is impeached and his successor appoints someone else. And he does it in the press.
Upon reading this, Cornyn announces that Franken won't have a signed certification either, and the GOP will use it to keep him from being seated,
Blago laughs out loud. This is amateur night in Dixieland. He leaks to the press that he spoke with Reid before the election, and that Reid didn't think any of the African American candidates vying for the seat were "electable," while Tammy Duckworth was. He stirs up the potential jury pool and makes Reid look like an idiot -- the day before Reid is set to appear on Meet the Press.
Reid looks like a cat in a room full of rocking chairs on Meet the Press. Nobody knows how much Fitz has (not even Fitz, who is still trying to transcribe his tapes) or how much he'll need to reveal to prove his case, so Reid says he "doesn't remember" his conversation with Blago, but calls Blago a liar anyway. When asked if he supported Jesse Jackson Jr. for the Senate seat, he says he would support JJJ. And admits that there's "room to negotiate" on Burris.
Burris appears at the Senate on Tuesday. Gets turned away. Could Reid look any worse?
Yes!
Obama stares down DiFi, appoints Panetta to the CIA, and the NYT breaks the story before she's told (but Ron Wyden already knows). DiFi's fuming.
Despite having been one of the 50 Senators who signed Reid's letter saying Burris would never be seated, she announces that as the outgoing head of the Rules Committee she thinks the Senate has no choice but to seat him. (Good timing, because Charlie Rangel is already complaining about the Rules Committee dragging its feet, and Jesse White is complaining that Reid made him the fall guy.)
Reid can't hold his own caucus in line. Blames Rahm. Gives interview saying "I don't work for Barack Obama."
Smooth. . . .
Posted by: Mike ||
01/08/2009
07:28 ||
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#1
She must be psychic. I was thinking the same thing yesterday. I'd own half of Nevada.
Dozens of residents claimed to have seen bright flashing spheres is the skies near Louth, Lincolnshire, where a 290ft turbine was mangled in a mystery collision.
One woman said she saw the an object fly towards the wind farm, while others described the lights as being linked by "tentacles", leading locals to dub it the octopus UFO.
Dorothy Willows, who lives a mile and a half from the crash site, said: "The lights were moving across the sky towards the wind farm. Then I saw a low flying object. It was skimming across the sky towards the turbines."
Later on Sunday night, one of a turbine's 65ft blades was ripped off and another severely damaged.
The Health and Safety Executive described the damage as a "unique incident", and the energy firm Ecotricity which owns the 20-turbine site say it has no explanation.
"We are struggling to find an answer, yes, and it has been quite interesting to read the reports in the press about what people have seen," Dale Vince from the company told BBC Radio Four's Today programme..
"It sounds unbelievable but actually we don't have any explanation at the moment. Give us a few days and if there is a rational explanation we will find it."
Robert Palmer, chairman of East Lindsey District Council, was among the dozens of people who reported seeing strange lights in the sky in the evening before the incident. Another witness, John Harrison, described looking at the farm out of his window and seeing "a massive ball of light with tentacles going right down to the ground".
UFO enthusiasts have described the incident as potentially one of the most significant encounters in years, and have called for the damaged parts to be tested to uncover the cause of the collision. A more down-to-earth theory is that the turbine was damaged due to the build up of ice on the blades.
The Ministry of Defence said that it did not investigae UFO sightings unless there was evidence of a potential threat to the UK.
#5
Too bad nobody got video of the actual destruction in progress.
We could have all enjoyed watched it on Discovery's "Destroyed in Seconds." :-D
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
01/08/2009 17:07
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#6
Sounds like someboy at DARPA, Area 51, or Wright-Patterson is going to be getting a bunch of Police-Court tickets + Atorney-certifed legal bills.
Lessirree > e.g. [State-OWG] DWL, ILLEGAL PARKING, ILLEGAL PACING/TOWING, CAUSING AN ACCIDENT, INSURANCE, + LEAVING THE SCENE OF AN ACCIDENT, for starters. YOU JUST KNOW MOM, DAD, COLONY + SPACE UNIVERSITY ADMIN. AREN'T GONNA LIKE IT ONE BIT.
Dear protestors, Arab Israelis, and citizens of the world:
We are in favor of the democratic right of every person to rally in favor whatever he or she feel like, even if we are talking about Israeli citizens demonstrating against their country at a time of war.
...Yet nonetheless, and with all due respect, we wish to tell you something at this time: Your views do not really make a difference to us right now. At this moment, when we are fighting for the wellbeing of southern residents, the level of support we receive from you does not matter to us too much. It is irrelevant.
The important thing is that tens of thousands of Israeli citizens will be able to live a normative life; the kind of life where no Grad or any other kind of rocket would be landing on their heads in the middle of the street.
This may sound a little odd, yet if in order to secure this kind of normative life we need to turn the lives of Gaza residents into hell, then with great regret this is precisely what we shall be doing.
We would of course be happy to only hurt Hamas terrorists in surgical strikes, yet this is a little difficult to achieve when the terrorists are operating in the midst of the civilian population in Gaza.
You may be surprised about this, yet when it comes to a choice between the option of allowing southern Israel residents to continue being hurt and the option of hitting the terrorists with full force, while realizing that innocent civilians in Gaza will be hurt too along the way, we choose to side with our own citizens. How weird indeed.
Oh, yeah, I almost forgot something else: We already withdrew from the Gaza Strip. A long time ago. Perhaps you repressed this minor detail, yet we uprooted settlements, just the way you like it. We expelled Jews from their homes, in line with our own decision, just in order to get out of Gaza. We carried a brutal transfer to the residents of Gush Katif just to secure some peace and quiet.
So next time you ask us to evacuate settlements, ask yourselves what we'll be getting in return.
Seems almost laughable. Until you consider the fact that they probably don't believe in Global Warming.
A woman in rural Papua New Guinea was bound and gagged, tied to a log and set ablaze on a pile of tires this week, possibly because villagers suspected her of being a witch, police said Thursday. Her death adds to a growing list of men and women who have been accused of sorcery and then tortured or killed in the South Pacific island nation, where traditional beliefs hold sway in many regions.
The victims are often scapegoats for someone else's unexplained death -- and bands of tribesmen collude to mete out justice to them for their supposed magical powers, police said. Sounds like a primitive culture's version of layoffs.
"We have had quite difficulties in a number of previous incidents convincing people to come forward with information," said Simon Kauba, assistant commissioner of police and commander of the Highlands region, where the killing occurred. "We are trying to persuade them to help. Somebody lost their mother or daughter or sister Tuesday morning."
Early Tuesday morning, a group of people dragged the woman, believed to be in her late teens to early 20s, to a dumping ground outside the city of Mount Hagen. They stripped her naked, bound her hands and legs, stuffed a cloth in her mouth, tied her to a log and set her on fire, Mauba said.
"When the people living nearby went to the dump site to investigate what caused the fire, they found a human being burning in the flames," he said. "It was ugly." The fact that they were roasting marshmallows didn't help appearances, either.
The country's Post-Courier newspaper reported Thursday that more than 50 people were killed in two Highlands provinces last year for allegedly practicing sorcery.
In a well-publicized case last year, a pregnant woman gave birth to a baby girl while struggling to free herself from a tree. Villagers had dragged the woman from her house and hung her from the tree, accusing her of sorcery after her neighbor suddenly died. She and the baby survived, according to media reports.
Killings of witches, or sangumas, is not a new phenomenon in rural areas of the country. Yeesh. Don't use a cigarette lighter where they can see you.
Emory University anthropology Professor Bruce Knauft, who lived in a village in the western province of Papua New Guinea in the early 1980s, traced family histories for 42 years and found that 1 in 3 adult deaths were homicides -- "the bulk of these being collective killings of suspected sorcerers," he wrote in his book, From Primitive to Postcolonial in Melanesia and Anthropology. And whatever you do, do NOT show them your Blackberry.
In recent years, as AIDS has taken a toll in the nation of 6.7 million people, villagers have blamed suspected witches -- and not the virus -- for the deaths.
According to the United Nations, Papua New Guinea accounts for 90 percent of the Pacific region's HIV cases and is one of four Asia-Pacific countries with an epidemic.
"We've had a number of cases where people were killed because they were accused of spreading HIV or AIDS," Mauba said. Send 'em off to Korea. I hear Kim Jong Il came up with a cure for that a few years back.
While there is plenty of speculation why Tuesday's victim was killed, police said they are focused more on who committed the crime. Maybe it would be more productive at this point to just start handing out flyers about what causes AIDS. Fewer people dead at the end of the day is usually the best way to go. Besides, when the tribesmen figure out what really happened, they'll probably kill the accuser themselves.
"If it is phobias about alleged HIV/AIDS or claims of a sexual affair, we must urge the police and judiciary to throw the book at the offenders," the Post-Courier wrote in an editorial. Fine. As long as the book looks like an anvil, it ought to work.
"There are remedies far, far better than to torture and immolate a young woman before she can be judged by a lawful system." Tell that to the tribesmen.
#1
Jeez! Gorb. Your humor is a little rough for my tender eyes. This is a pretty graphic description of a brutal murder of a real person. It's time for the government to round up the usual suspects and find who brought the marshmellows. Now, I'm doing it, too! Stop it! Stop it!
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
01/08/2009 7:45
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Don't you dare try to civilize them.
You'll have every leftist human rights organization in the world land on the back of your neck.
Thailand's new premier must ensure that troops who tortured and killed a Muslim cleric in the far south face justice, a rights group said on Thursday, adding that such abuses fuelled unrest in the region. Imam Yapa Koseng, a 56-year-old religious leader, was arrested in March last year and died days later in military custody in the Muslim-majority deep south, where a deadly separatist insurgency is raging.
'Prosecuting the soldiers who killed an imam in army detention will be a test of the administration of Thailand's new prime minister, Abhisit Vejjajiva,' New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said in a statement. An inquest in Narathiwat province last month ruled that Yapa died after beatings by soldiers during interrogation, an army spokesman told AFP, adding that they planned to begin the process to prosecute five soldiers.
HRW said the imam's death highlighted broader human rights violations in the south, including illegal and arbitrary detention and torture including beatings, electric shocks and strangulation.
'The new government needs to overhaul the counter-insurgency strategy that encourages abuses, impose effective civilian control over the army, and provide efficient redress for victims of abuses,' said HRW Asia Director Brad Adams. 'By relying on repressive measures and restrictions on fundamental human rights, Thai authorities have created a fertile ground for the insurgency to expand.'
#1
No word from HRW about the hundreds of innocent villagers hacked to death by insurgents. My suggestion to HRW Asia Director Brad Adams is an auto-erotic maneuver that is difficult, if not impossible to perform. Sheesh, wherever to they find these idiots?
#2
I don't think it's Iran's big move. I think it is just a bone to keep the world busy whilst they press forward with their plans for world domination via a few nukes.
#5
ION MEMRI > IN AN OPEN LETTER TO BARACK OBAMA, THE CHIEF OF THE TORA BORA BATTLEFIELD HAS WARNED THAT THE FLAMES OF THIS GAZA FIGHT WILL "BLOW UP IN WASHINGTON".
Whew, too early in the Guam AM for anuther long Title.
#3
Game on, Tehran? Raging conflict while the new (unimpressive) crew takes the reins? Desperate attempt to forestall pre-emptive strike on mullah-nukes? Too much wine in my evening? (actually, not a drop tonight)
At least three Katyusha rockets fired from southern Lebanon land in Western Galilee region Thursday morning, near town of Nahariya; two people reported wounded in attack. School day cancelled in town
Ynet reporters
Published: 01.08.09, 07:50 / Israel News
A Katyusha barrage was fired Thursday at the Nahariya area in the Western Galilee. Police reported that two people were lightly wounded and evacuated to the local hospital. Several residents were treated for shock.
Police sappers received reports of three rocket hits, one in town and two others in open fields nearby.
Residents rushed to take cover in shelters and fortified areas, as children throughout the town were on their way to school.
The Magen David Adom emergency services raised their alert level to the maximum following the attack.
Foresight
Northerners prepare for possible attacks / Hagai Einav
Gaza operation and deteriorating situation in southern Israel prompt northern communities to prepare for possible attacks. Kiryat Shmona, other towns inspect bomb shelters, Ziv Medical Centers instructs staff to stay nearby
Full Story
The Home Front Command ordered residents to remain close to fortified areas.
Nahariya Mayor Jacky Sabag ordered school day in town cancelled in light of the attack. School was also cancelled in the neighboring community of Shlomi.
Hizbullah's television station al-Manar reported of the Katyusha attack at northern Israel, but did not attribute the fire to the organization.
Hizbullah forces have been put on the highest alert level this week, the London-based Arabic-language newspaper Al-Hayat reported on Tuesday.
Earlier in the week Ynet reported that Lebanon was anxiously following the developments in Gaza. According to Al-Hayat, Hizbullah raised its alert level after Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak called up thousands of reserve soldiers and said some of them would be deployed along the northern border.
A Lebanese source was quoted by the paper as saying that the Shiite group is determined "not to give Israel a chance to avenge its defeat in the July 2006 war and has therefore raised its alert level for defense purposes."
Ahiya Raved, Hagai Einav, Roee Nahmias and Sharon Roffe-Ofir contributed to the report
#5
4 Injured in attack up North.
8:55 AM First reports are saying that Palestinians in Lebanon fired the missiles on their own initiative and not Hizbollah. No confirmation yet on this report.
#6
I Hope and Pray that the Israelis quits possy footing around with Iran.
YES! What's needed:
A Focused and Liberal SHOCK and AWE Campaign, extended and sustained OVER, UNDER, AROUND and THROUGH Iran including plenty of left over 50,000,000 degree heat which should permanently impress and fuse Iran's ankle biters hiding out in South Lebanon.
Israel must deal with her sworn enemies because no one else will save her especially the Bad Actors and Bastxrds here in the West who are only willing to watch Israel commit suicide while they scold her.
Posted by: Red Dawg ||
01/08/2009 2:22
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#7
p ssy =
Posted by: Red Dawg ||
01/08/2009 2:24
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#8
Attack in North hit a Nursing Home
9:28 AM Rocket launched up North were not short-range Katyushas indicating the likelihood that Hizbollah did launch them.
(from http://muqata.blogspot.com/)
#12
You're exactly right Verlaine. The Hez-beasts and their Iranian masters have stepped into the trap and the jaws or closing. Israel has 12 days to engage and, if humanly possible finish off Iran's nukes before the Obama administration takes office.
#13
Oil Rises as Lebanon Rockets Hit Israel, Widening Gaza Conflict Crude oil rose, rebounding from its biggest decline in seven years, after rockets fired from Lebanon hit Israel, raising concern the widening Gaza conflict will threaten Middle East oil supplies.
Further rockets fired from Lebanon landed in northern Israel after a salvo launched last night, Agence France-Presse reported. Venezuela said it cut crude sales in accordance with last months OPEC decision, following similar notices from other members including Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates. Yesterday, crude plunged the most since 2001 as U.S. stockpiles increased more than expected.
Investors fear that if the conflict escalates Arab countries could unite against Israel, said Andrey Kryuchenkov, an analyst with VTB Group in London. And you have a huge producer, Iran, right next door, so events like this really intensify the geopolitical risk premium that exists generally in the Middle East
#14
Reports the Katyushas from this morning were fired from next to UNIFIL base.
The Ahmed Jabril terror organization take responsibility for rocket attack in North
Hamas declines to progress with the Egyptian cease fire proposal
the question of the hour from the twitter site: Why is Hamas shooting at Israel during the 3-hour Humanitarian Cease Fire? Sederot is under heavy rocket fire the past 15 mins.
#16
Ahmed Jibril heads the PFLP-General Command. He's of Paleo descent, and was a captain in the Syrian army before breaking the group off from PFLP. PFLP-GC is a Syrian sock puppet.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009 9:04
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#20
Reports the Katyushas from this morning were fired from next to UNIFIL base.
Why am I not surprised? But, uh, just for future reference, when the UN tries to broker a ceasefire with promises of a UN security force to enforce it, keep this little incident in mind.
#24
Well, my guess is everyone is going to bitch out Israel for "oppressing" the Palestinians, and they're going to bail. Obama's only comment was that he felt sorry for the civilian casualties (i.e., his Palestinian buddies).
Then, Obama is wanting to tube the economy so that his "new world order--one world government" thing can get rolling, and this is a prime time to do it. The Dems already were successful in tipping the economy for their "October Surprise" and now they want to finish it. Like I said before, we're going to be watching the Presidency of (sociopath) Bill Ayers throughout Obama's term. His one goal is to take the US (vicariously his daddy) down. It's a personal thing.
Remember when Biden said, "something's gonna happen (after Obama takes office), and it might not seem like what we're going to do is the right thing, but you have to trust us that it is the right thing,"
Whatever "IT" is, it's already been planned. Everything else is just fluff, and designed to guarantee the "cooperation" of the populace. Nothing like taking people's money as a way to get them to cooperate . . .
With Gaza and the north hammering Israel, "SOMEONE" is going to have to come into the situation and bring "peace." My guess, Obama. And he'll make Jerusalem an "international city" under the auspices of the UN.
We'll see.
I agree that Israel should wipe out Iran's nukes now rather than later, since "later" is up in the air, and more like never with Obama leading the US.
#25
And here it is . . . the beginning of the new world order. All these pesky wars. All this economic turmoil . . . who will save us. OBAMA WILL SAVE US, and the WORLD (start music).
(from drudge)
PARIS The leaders of France and Germany appeared to put disagreements over economic policy behind them Thursday, calling on the U.S. to join global efforts to address the financial crisis.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, leading a two-day conference with former British Prime Minister Tony Blair on the future of capitalism, said the crisis has shown that no country can go it alone on economic policy. "In the 21st century, there it is no longer a single nation who can say what we should do or what we should think," he said.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the system "cannot continue as it is" and called for better-regulated financial markets.
. . .
"Leaders should look beyond financial markets, she (Merkel) said, singling out the American budget deficit and China's current account surplus or trade balance as problems upsetting the global economy.
A Congressional Budget Office report estimates that the U.S. federal budget deficit will hit an unparalleled $1.2 trillion for the 2009 budget year and that is before President-elect Barack Obama's sweeping stimulus package is calculated.
(WHICH WILL GET US IN THE HOLE FOREVER)
Merkel said the International Monetary Fund has not managed to regulate global capitalism, and she called for the creation of an economy body at the United Nations, similar to the Security Council, to judge government policy.
But no more: "In capitalism of the 21st century, there is room for the state," he (Sarkozy) said.
So, there is more to the Katusha's than one might think . . .
WAR + BAD ECONOMY + SOCIALIST USA PRESIDENT = new world order
Maybe they'll listen to someone from a long time ago . . . .
A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within.
An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly.
But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself.
For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men.
He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist.
A murderer is less to fear. The traitor is the plague.
Marcus Tullius Cicero (Ancient Roman Lawyer, Writer, Scholar, Orator and Statesman)
#28
My wish: Obama vs. Cicero in debate on the fundamentals of democracy. Oh wait, Obama's too busy deciding which FAMILY DOG will get him the most public brownie points . . .
A deficit during a RECESSION makes sense. It doesnt make sense during a boom. Guess who ran a massive deficit during a boom. Can you spell B-U-S-H?
There has been some coordination of macro economic policy since Bretton Woods. Google that, if you dont know what it is. Yes, it IS an inevitable result of economic ties between nations. NO it doesnt mean the end of sovereignty. hell the euros cant even manage to coordinate macro econ policy among themselves very well, and the EU is supposed to be this eevil superstate.
and yes, there is a role for the state in modern capitalism. Social welfare goes back to Bismarck. Economic regulation in the US goes back to the 1880s, and in a bigger way to Theodore Roosevelt.
Note Bene, if you think Obama is a commie on economics, you would NOT feel comfortable living in Israel.
Calm down. Take a deep breath. Obama has so far proposed a more moderate admin than I for one expected.
#32
I think he would have a hard enough time vs. Clay Jenkinson, nevermind Cicero...so long as we don't have a Alcibiades on our hands. He changes his story so much I personally cannot believe a word he says.
Hamas wanted a prize fight and now they got it. Those working against Israel and trying to make it a 3 round limit now that their boxer is getting pummelled so as to let the judges decide the winner rather than have a KO. Smoke any location a rocket has been fired from and do it before they call the fight.
Posted by: Mike N. ||
01/08/2009 18:00
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#37
same site:
Over 450 Rockets fired at Israel from Gaza, since start of Cast Lead operation.
Today officially marks the legal end of Abu Mazeen's presidency. According to PA law, Hamas now controls the Presidency of the Palestinian Authority - including within Palestinian Occupied Judea and Samaria (West Bank). Will Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazeen) step down? Will Hamas fight to take control? Who does the (American trained) Palestinian Police now take orders from? Will America demand that PA law be upheld and Hamas legally take over, or will it demand a coup and keep Abu Mazen in power?
According to PA law the presidency now automatically goes to the Speaker, but (Hamas) Speaker Aziz Dweik is currently in jail in Israel, making (Hamas) Gaza-based Deputy Speaker Ahmed Bahar next in line. Abu Mazeen is claiming he can extend his presidency for up to another year (he has been taking lessons from Ehud Olmert).
#38
This northern salvo is a shot at the UN. They are administering the ceasefire in Lebanon, and making all the noise in Gaza about the humanitarian crisis. They clearly cannot manage either.
It will not take long for the truthers to accuse the Israelis of fired the rockets themselves, as it put the UN in a very embarrassing position.
#39
A number of Netters are arguing that, as per this posting time, ISRAEL may not think this is an actual HIZB-LED ROCKET STRIKE given the IDF's lack of strong counterresponse yet to same???
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah on Wednesday warned that should Israel attack Lebanon, it would suffer an even greater defeat than the one he claimed it suffered in 2006.
"We are prepared for every possibility and are ready for all aggression... The Zionists will discover that the war they had in July was a walk in the park if we compare it to what we've prepared for every new aggression," Nasrallah said, referring to the Second Lebanon War.
Nasrallah also chastised Arab leaders for trying to mediate a truce between Palestinian Hamas and Israel, instead of siding with the embattled Palestinians in Gaza.
regarding the one sided NY Times coverage of Muhammad Saad Iqbal's story, GitMo - > Pakiwakiland.
You would never know from reading the Times' article that Iqbal was accused of plotting to kill a U.S. official in Indonesia. There is no hint of the fact that Iqbal himself admitted to consorting with terrorists. Instead, Iqbal is portrayed as an obvious innocent who was wrongly tortured.
As with nearly all terrorism-related matters, there is ambiguity. The full truth of Iqbal's life may be impossible to piece together. Nevertheless, let us consider the available evidence found in the U.S. government's unclassified files, which were produced online by the Department of Defense and then republished by the Times in its own online database. Despite being freely available, the Times ignored most of the files' contents when reporting on Iqbal.
#1
Let the NYT management have custody of this guy and full responsibility for any crimes he may commit. As in, he kills - you die! Then read their editorials.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
01/08/2009 7:58
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#2
The NYT is going broke and I don't see any way for them to avoid that, they'll go out with their Anti-American guns blazing.
And I say don't let the door hit you in the arse.
#3
Everyone who writes a comment on Rantburg could run a better newspaper than the NY Times. Tell the truth. Be pro-American in America. That seems to be beyond the ability of the NY Times.
Israel has taken a battering in the global propaganda battle over its war on Hamas, despite deploying all weaponry ranging from Youtube videos to Twitter blogs and an overworked spokeswoman, analysts said.
Governments have slammed the Israeli military onslaught on the Gaza Strip, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has condemned attacks near U.N. schools that killed dozens and foreign media are angry at being kept out of the Palestinian territory.
With images of parents carrying lifeless children to overwhelmed hospitals dominating international media, angry protests have been staged in major capitals and Israeli websites have reportedly come under cyber attack.
European Union External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner told President Shimon Peres in a meeting on Tuesday that "Israel's image is being destroyed" by its refusal to heed ceasefire appeals.
Hate to be cynical, but Israel's international image hasn't been good for years, decades even. So what's the long-term consequence? As far as I can see, just mean words from the EU and the UN. If Israel were to show some more spine and look the Y'urp-peons, UN-uchs and the press in the eye and say "screw you guys, we're finishing the job", the only response would be helpless splutter and eye-rolling.
Hamas has concentrated on the Arabic media and shunned the West. Israel has launched a sophisticated public relations campaign to keep the focus on cross-border rocket attacks from Gaza that preceded the war.
Military spokeswoman Major Avital Liebovich has become an international media celebrity fending off tough questions about Israeli attacks and the mounting toll.
Israeli ambassadors have also been sent into the television battle. The defense ministry has posted videos of Israeli air strikes on Hamas targets on Youtube, and the government has organized Facebook groups.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
Israelis should have stopped caring long time ago--no matter what they do, it is always wrong from the perspective of anti-semitic cesspool.
#4
Israel needs to wage its media campaign with two target audiences in mind. And each of them requires a different message. The leaders in the West must be told in no uncertain terms that the era of the diplo-dance is over period. Then present them with the choice. What is more acceptable one side making indiscriminate rocket attacks into civilian population centers or one side making targeted strikes with all efforts to avoid civilian casualties? You need to choose because you cant have both. Oh and BTW you can shove that Proportionality argument up yer chute! Then ask the Arab leaders a simple question The Paleo cause is one thing but is HAMAS really worth it? Other then that, trying to persuade the ignorant, the handwringers, and the haters is really an exercise in futility.
#6
The fact that al Arabiya felt the need to post this suggests "whistling past the graveyard", which is to say, they're alarmed that Israel isn't getting as much of the filthy end of the stick as they normally do in these situations.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
01/08/2009 10:58
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#7
Most people accept the propoganda without knowing the issues at hand, especially legal ones. Israel needs to keep up the videos and blogs, but the facts, such as Hamas' violations of the Geneva Conventions by storing weapons in schools and using Red Cross ambulances needs to be widely circulated in the media. Just like 'green helmet guy' was exposed, the bloggers can be invaluable in digging out the truth. Learn the lessons of Iraq-the war can be won, one battle a time.
The scenes from Gaza are heartbreaking. But the whole conflict could be avoided if the Palestinians said one small thing
Daniel Finkelstein
It was strictly forbidden to have a notebook in Belsen, but my Aunt Ruth had one anyway. Just a little pocket diary - an appointment book with one of those tiny pencils. And in it, in the autumn of 1944, she noted that Anne Frank and Anne's sister, Ruth's schoolfriend Margot, had arrived in the concentration camp.
My mother and my aunt had been watching through the camp wire when the Franks arrived. Mum remembers it well, because they had been excited to spot girls they knew from the old days in Amsterdam. They had played in the same streets, been to the same schools and Ruth and Margot attended Hebrew classes together. The pair had once been pressed into service to act as bridesmaids, when a secretive Jewish wedding had taken place at the synagogue during their lesson time.
But Ruth and Margot did not grow up together. Because while Ruth and my mother lived, Margot and Anne never left Belsen. They died of typhus.
I am telling you this story because I want you to understand Israel. Not to agree with all it does, not to keep quiet when you want to protest against its actions, not to side with it always, merely to understand Israel.
There are two things about the tale that help to provide insight. The first is that all these things, the gas chambers, the concentration camps, the attempt to wipe Jews from the face of the Earth, they aren't ancient history, and they aren't fable. They happened to real people and they happened in our lifetime. Anne and Margot Frank were just children to my aunt and my mother; they weren't icons, or symbols of anything.
The second is that world opinion weeps now for Anne Frank. But world opinion did not save her.
The origin of the state of Israel is not religion or nationalism, it is the experience of oppression and murder, the fear of total annihilation and the bitter conclusion that world opinion could not be relied upon to protect the Jews.
Israel was the idea of a journalist. Theodor Herzl was the Paris correspondent of the Neue Freie Presse when he witnessed anti-Semitic rioting against the Jewish army captain Alfred Dreyfus who had been falsely accused of espionage. Herzl was then among the small corps of journalists who in 1895 witnessed the famous ceremony of disgrace in which Dreyfus was stripped of his epaulettes.
The experience led Herzl to abandon his belief in assimilation. He became convinced that Jews would only be safe if they had their own national home. Herzl became the first leader of modern Zionism. For many years many Jews resisted Herzl's conclusion. My grandfather was among them. But the experience of Jews all over the world in the first half of the 20th century - not just in Europe but in the Middle East too - rather bore out Herzl.
So when Israel is urged to respect world opinion and put its faith in the international community the point is rather being missed. The very idea of Israel is a rejection of this option. Israel only exists because Jews do not feel safe as the wards of world opinion. Zionism, that word that is so abused, so reviled, is founded on a determination that, at the end of the day, somehow the Jews will defend themselves and their fellow Jews from destruction. If world opinion was enough, there would be no Israel.
The poverty and the death and the despair among the Palestinians in Gaza moves me to tears. How can it not? Who can see pictures of children in a war zone or a slum street and not be angry and bewildered and driven to protest? And what is so appalling is that it is so unnecessary. For there can be peace and prosperity at the smallest of prices. The Palestinians need only say that they will allow Israel to exist in peace. They need only say this tiny thing, and mean it, and there is pretty much nothing they cannot have.
Yet they will not say it. And they will not mean it. For they do not want the Jews. Again and again - again and again - the Palestinians have been offered a nation state in a divided Palestine. And again and again they have turned the offer down, for it has always been more important to drive out the Jews than to have a Palestinian state. It is difficult sometimes to avoid the feeling that Hamas and Hezbollah don't want to kill Jews because they hate Israel. They hate Israel because they want to kill Jews.
There cannot be peace until this changes. For Israel will not rely on airy guarantees and international gestures to defend it. At its very core, it will not. It will lay down its arms when the Jews are safe, but it will not do it until they are.
And if you reflect on it, doesn't recent experience bear this out? Just as Herzl was borne out? A year or so back I met a teacher while I was on holiday and fell to talking with him about Israel. He was a nice man and all he wanted was for fighting to stop and to end the suffering of children. And he had a question for me.
Why, he asked, doesn't Israel offer to give back the West Bank and Gaza? Why doesn't it just let the Palestinians have a state there? If the Palestinians turned it down, he said, then at least liberal opinion would be on Israel's side and would rally to its assistance.
So I patiently explained to this kind, good man that Israel had, at Camp David in 2000, made precisely this offer and that it had been rejected out of hand by Yassir Arafat, not even used as the basis for negotiation. I told him that Israel was no longer in Gaza, having withdrawn unilaterally and taken the settlers with it. The Palestinians had greeted this movement with suicide bombs and rockets. Yet the teacher, with all his compassion, wasn't even aware of all this. And liberal opinion? Sad to relate, my new friend's faith in it was misplaced. It has turned strongly against Israel.
Israel has made many mistakes. It has acted too aggressively on some occasions, has been too defensive on others. The country hasn't always respected the human rights of its enemies as it should have done. What nation under such a threat would have avoided all errors?
But you know what? As Iran gets a nuclear weapon and so the potential for another Holocaust against the Jews and world opinion does nothing, I am not so sure that the errors of world opinion are so much to be preferred to the errors of Israel.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/08/2009
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#1
Israel's friends can't be counted on for the long haul. To ensure their own survival, Israel needs to occupy Gaza until the job's done, like what we did in Japan and are doing in Iraq.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
01/08/2009 7:54
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#2
You can't coexist with an enemy that is hell bent on your annihilation. The paleostains have built this thing up in their minds to be some kind of divine struggle with themselves as warriors of god or something. You can't reason with them, you can't bargain with them, you can't persuade them. All you can do is make sure they can't hurt you.
Aswat al-Iraq: Two cleaning workers from Mosul municipality were wounded in an improvised explosive device (IED) blast in the downtown of the city, a police source said on Wednesday.
"A small-sized explosive charge detonated close to two cleaning workers who were doing their job on al-Kornish Street, downtown Mosul," the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Israel is expelling Venezuela's charge d'affaires in response to the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador to Caracas over the war in Gaza, a foreign ministry spokesman said on Wednesday.
"We obviously will take retaliatory measures and will expel the Venezuelan charge d'affaires in Tel Aviv" on Wednesday, the spokesman, Yigal Palmor, told AFP.
The charge d'affaires is Venezuela's top diplomat to the Jewish state.
The Venezuelan government on Tuesday ordered the expulsion of Israel's ambassador to Caracas to protest the Israeli military's offensive in the Gaza Strip, the foreign ministry said in a statement.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
go a step further and don't even let him get his clothes before he leaves
A group of Iranian hackers says they have managed to bring down the Israeli secret service's web site to voice solidarity with Gazans.
Ashiyaneh, a group of Iranian hackers announced they had carried out the cyber attack against Mossad's web site to protest the ongoing Israeli onslaught on the Gaza Strip, Fars news agency reported on Wednesday.
"The Zionist Regime considers the merciless killing of the defenseless people in Gaza as its right and assumes that the world people will keep silent about it," the hacker group announced in a statement.
The head of the group has said the fact Mossad's web site has been hacked despite high security measures makes the spy agency a laughing stock.
It is more than two hours that the web site is down and the Israeli intelligence service has failed to resume the function of the Web site, the report added.
Posted by: Fred ||
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NAJAF, Iraq - The Shia radical movement of Moqtada al-Sadr, which fought two wars with US troops in 2004, threatened on Wednesday to resume attacks on American targets inside Iraq over Washingtons support for the Israeli assault on Gaza. I ask the Iraqi resistance to engage in revenge operations against the United States, the biggest parter of the Zionist enemy, Sadr said in a statement issued by his office in the central shrine city of Najaf.
He called on all countries which host Israeli embassies on their territory to close down those missions which are the source of terrorism in Arab and Islamic countries as a sign of support for the Palestinian people.
He called on Iraqis to place Palestinian flags on the roofs of all buildings, mosques and churches in a show of support for the mujahedeen (holy warriors) in Gaza.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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#1
Sadr lives in Iran. Hasn't shown his face in Iraq for quite awhile now. Let Iran claim him now, they deserve him.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
01/08/2009 8:28
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Joe Biden has always had a flair for doing things differently -- but his upcoming trip to South Asia may set a new standard.
The vice president-elect will be traveling to Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. But he won't really be traveling as the vice president-elect -- he'll be traveling as the chairman of Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Only he'll be resigning from the Senate in a few weeks. Even though he was sworn in Tuesday for his seventh term.
Got that?
Many foreign policy observers don't, raising the concern that officials in the countries on Biden's itinerary may hold to the quaint notion that the vice president-elect is the vice president-elect and that Biden will be sending not-very-subtle signals about U.S. policy in the Obama administration -- even though George W. Bush is still in office.
Biden first ran the South Asia trip idea by Bush administration officials several weeks ago, said Bush spokesman Gordon Johndroe.
"We discussed the trip and reviewed it in advance with them," Johndroe said. "We are facilitating the trip administratively where necessary."
But that didn't stop some serious eye-rolling by others on the Bush team. "It's certainly unique," quipped a senior Bush administration official. "And I'll just leave it at that."
Biden described the nature of his trip to reporters Tuesday after his swearing-in ceremony. "I'm going to come back and report where I think things stand in each of those countries now," he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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During a visit to Afghanistan, Pakistan's foreign minister on Wednesday strongly rejected accusations by India that Pakistani government agencies had played a role in the terrorist attacks in Mumbai in November, insisting that his government wants to "get to the bottom" of the incident and hopes for cooperation with India, not "finger-pointing."
At the same time, Pakistan's powerful intelligence chief said in a rare interview from Islamabad that his government has no desire to fight a war with India, Pakistan's larger neighbor and longtime rival, and that he views terrorism as the "real enemy" of his country.
But in a sign of the deep internal fissures within Pakistan's government over the Mumbai attacks, the country's national security adviser was fired in Islamabad on Wednesday after publicly acknowledging that the lone surviving gunman appeared to be a Pakistani citizen, an allegation previously denied by Pakistani authorities.
In an interview with CNN, Mahmud Ali Durrani said there appeared to be proof that all 10 gunmen had Pakistani roots. Officials from the Foreign and Information ministries confirmed that assertion, but the Foreign Ministry later retracted its statement, and within hours, government officials and national TV channels reported that Durrani, a former intelligence chief, had been dismissed by Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Even in the wacky world of Big Apple real estate, this is a tale for the ages: a hot-dog vendor has agreed to pay the city $81,701 more a year to peddle franks on the north side of the Metropolitan Museum of Art entrance than on the south side 100 feet away.
In what may be the epitome of the location-is-everything maxim, the Parks Department has auctioned off the food-vending rights to the north-side entrance of the museum on Fifth Avenue at 82nd Street for $362,201 and the south-side entrance for $280,500, both to first-time vendor Pasang Sherpa.
The rents increase over the five-year term of the contract, to $384,371 and $297,669, respectively.
"That [north] side is more busy," explained Sherpa. Many museum visitors use the nearby 86th Street/Lexington Avenue subway express stop to the north.
"It's just the flow of traffic," agreed competitor Dan Rossi, who set up shop without permission and isn't paying the city a cent, citing a regulation that lets veterans like himself bypass the bidding process.
Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe said all bidders were made aware they wouldn't be getting an exclusive franchise, and added the lofty results were a "pleasant surprise."
Sherpa, 50, who used to sell jewelry on Canal Street, outbid the New York One hot-dog company by a total of $65,000 a year, as well as a third bidder.
With more than 5 million visitors a year, the Met is a hot-dog seller's paradise since the nearest eateries are blocks away.
The location has also become a cash cow for the Parks Department, which has been able to increase vending rents steadily on what might be the most expensive retail space per square foot in the country.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
D **** NG, forgot the source but IIRC ARTICLE > Milyuhns and Zilyuhns and Tilyuhns of CATS/FELINES were repor being shipped to CHINA [restaurants] to be killed and served as Entrees = Main Courses???
#6
1 in 10 visitors get a dog on way in or out and take home $.25 per dog it would be doing alright thats $125,000; and that is a very low end guestimate - that is regular commuters not counted and/or take home more per dog.
#9
Just imagine how much a land Value Tax would raise USA wide! You could get rid of harmful taxes on Income, profits, inheritance, purchases & tariffs and have enough left over to give every U.S. citizen a dividend that would make immigration less problematic (no dividend).
I know it might be a bit too capitalistic for you guys to run the whole country like a business, but I think it's a good idea.
#10
the met is on 5th avenue in a residential area. There are NO restaurants nearby, IIRC. You buy a hot dog, OR you pay the outrageous amounts at the museum restaurant, OR you walk all the way to Lexington avenue. I doubt they are making only .25 per hot dog.
#12
one of my room mates in college worked as a hot dog vendor there in the late 80's. he 'subbed' the spot and rented the cart from the guy who had forked out for the license. he said he walked away with $350 on a slow day after expenses. also said the guy he subbed from made more that 2x that.
this was 20 years ago... i am sure they do better now
Posted by: Abu do you love ||
01/08/2009 22:40
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#13
by there i mean in the city.. i don't know what address he worked. said he had a decent spot, but couldn't get an in with anyplace real good as they get doled out as favors to people who "keep things running" i suppose that meant "i want you to give the best spot to my cousin's kid or jimmy the weasel will keep loosing your deliveries and you wont sell no hot dogs for a whiles"
Posted by: Abu do you love ||
01/08/2009 22:45
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Palestinian militants from the Gaza Strip on Wednesday fired 25 rockets into Israel's southern communities, including Be'er Sheva and Ashkelon. The number was significantly lower than the average absorbed by these communities in recent weeks.
Two rockets exploded in Be'er Sheva just after 4 P.M., minutes following the expiration of a 3-hour truce between Israel and Hamas which was meant to ensure a temporary free flow of aid to Gaza residents. Some structures in the city were lightly damaged, but there were no casualties. Following that attack, more rockets were reported exploding in the Sha'ar Hanegev Regional Council, close to the Gaza Strip.
Earlier in the afternoon, two rockets hit Ashkelon, one exploding in the backyard of a three-story building. Nine people were treated for shock, but no other casualties were reported. Four rockets struck Sderot earlier Wednesday, Ofakim and Netivot were each hit by two rockets and one landed in Kiryat Malachi.
Palestinian militants this week have continued the daily barrage of rockets that Israel has sought to halt in its 12-day air and ground campaign against Hamas in Gaza.
On Tuesday, a Grad rocket fired by militants struck Gedera, located 30 kilometers from Tel Aviv, and lightly injured a 3-month-old baby. The rocket struck a road in the southern section of Gedera, close to residential housing, in the first such attack on the central Israel city. The baby sustained wounds from shards of glass that hit her face, and was subsequently taken to a hospital for treatment. Four people were also treated for shock, including the baby's mother.
Gaza militants fired almost 30 other rockets into Israel on Tuesday, causing neither casualties nor property damage. Most of the rockets hit the western Negev, and the southern towns of Netivot and Ofakim.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Isn't there some sort of fire finder radar that can pin point launch sites for counter fire? Or, have I been reading too much Tom Clancy?
#2
it exists, but you need the will to order the counter battery. Hamas tends to set these off in the close proximity of fluffy ducks and bunnies so a 155 barage while satisfying, might not be optimal if you have no balls and are enslaved by PC ideals and worried about 'international opinion'.
Posted by: Abu do you love ||
01/08/2009 19:14
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Bangladesh will hold talks with neighbouring countries to work out effective measures to fight militancy and terrorism for ensuring peace and stability in South Asia, said newly appointed Foreign Minister Dr Dipu Moni yesterday.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#5
Now, now. No advocation of violence on American soil.
He's not a citizen, solicitation of violence against American interests abroad would seem to be proper grounds for revocation of his residency. Send him back to wherever he came from.
*Then* go ahead and whack him. It's all about procedure, bigjim.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
01/08/2009 10:43
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#6
This piece of dog crap should never set foot on US soil again. If we don't get control over these fifth column turncoats we're going to soon have major issues right here. We see this spewing and go on in disbelief and pay no mind. Just what the Brits did 20 years ago.
#10
I'm afraid he's going to develop a serious case of sleepwalking, and falling off a 22-storey balcony in the middle of the night - IF he comes back to the US, where sleepwalking may become a pandemic for Islamists.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
01/08/2009 15:17
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#11
In sum, he's arguing that America per se must be attacked, + that Jihad take place agz or inside America as Islam's ultimate enemy and ISRAEL's GREATEST SUPPORTER. IFF YOU KILL AMERICA, YOU [inevitably]KILL ISRAEL.
MORE PRESSURE ON PRESSURE UPON PEBO = SOON-TO-BE POTUS OBAMA.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
01/08/2009 19:07
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#13
Deacon, you left out the part of him landing on 9 bullets. BTW he does have a petition pending to be granted US citizenship.
Posted by: bruce ||
01/08/2009 19:32
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#14
Compare wid ISRAELI MIL FORUM/WND > MAPPING SHARIA IN AMERICA: ARE AMERICANS SAFE FROM US MOSQUES ["Mapping Sharia" Special project from ME Pert and former USAF Special Agent Dave Gaubatz]???
One Chicago Public Schools manager must have really been jonesing for a cup of coffee when officials say she spent nearly $70,000 of the district's money to buy 30 cappuccino/espresso machines for a high school program. But five months after the machines were purchased, 22 remained unopened, one disappeared and three were being used at two schools--though not in the culinary arts program for which they were intended, the district's inspector general said Tuesday.
Officials in a department dealing with work-school programs allegedly separated the purchases to make them appear they came from 21 different schools and were under $10,000. By doing so, the purchases did not have to be competitively bid or win school board approval, said Jim Sullivan, the district's inspector general. As a result, he said, the district overpaid for the coffeemakers by more than $12,000. "They sat unused for a number of months . . . by not letting the schools know they were coming, it turned out at the time to be a waste of money," Sullivan said.
Anybody at the Trib bother to check out to which vendor the orders were placed? Who the owner of said vendor is related to? Who the owner has given money to in recent election campaigns? Sheesh, I gotta tell them everything ...
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
they should use those things to replace the ritalin they give the students
The biggest hurdle to winning a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip, according to diplomats and Israeli military officials, is a problem that has bedeviled Israel for years: how to stop Hamas from digging tunnels into Egypt in order to bring tons of rockets and other weaponry into Gaza.
Mediators are trying to come up with an anti-tunnel plan to satisfy Israel, which has said it won't agree to a truce unless it includes concrete measures to prevent Hamas from rearming. Some of the ideas under consideration include construction of a giant underground barrier along the nine-mile border between southern Gaza and Egypt, as well as international military patrols with the authority to search for and destroy any freshly built tunnels, Israeli officials said.
Former British prime minister Tony Blair, who along with several other European leaders has been trying to broker a deal, said Tuesday in Jerusalem that an "immediate cease-fire" was within reach if a solution to the tunnel problem could be found.
"These circumstances focus very much around clear action to cut off the supply of arms and money through the tunnels that go from Egypt into Gaza," Blair told BBC radio. "I think that is the one basis on which we could bring a quick halt to" the fighting, he added. "Otherwise, I think we are in for a protracted campaign."
Israeli military officials estimated that they had blown up about half of the estimated 300 smugglers' tunnels along the Gaza-Egyptian border since Israel began airstrikes Dec. 27.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#2
Can they not use ground penetrating radar to find the tunnels?
Seems they'd be fairly easy to collapse once found, they look like deathtraps anyway.
1. Enviro - Salt water canal (off the med) presumably will lead to more salinization of the ground water, a big issue. Fresh water to precious to use.
2. Symbolism - the Hamas sympathizers worldwide will scream that this makes Gaza more of a prison
3. Politics - A moat emphasizes the SEPERATION of Gaza from Egypt. Politically its more to Israel's advantage to emphasize the connection of Gaza and Egypt.
Despite mounting international pressure for an end to hostilities between Israel and Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip, Hamas declared on Wednesday that it would not accept any permanent cease-fire with Israel. According to the deputy head of Hamas's political bureau, Moussa Abu Marzouk, the group would not talk about a permanent cease-fire so long as Israel continued its "occupation," and would instead continue the "resistance." He said that Hamas stood by its demand for Israel to immediately halt its offensive, to withdraw from the Gaza Strip and to open all of the border crossings.
The borders between Israel and Gaza were closed when Hamas took control of the area in a violent coup against Palestinian Authority forces in June 2007.
In July 2008, a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel was signed which permitted the borders to be opened permanently so long as Palestinian rocket fire into Israeli territory ceased. As rocket fire persisted, Israel periodically closed the borders. In December 2008, Hamas declared it would not renew the cease-fire due to Israeli "violations."
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#2
They will only agree to a ceasefire if they are worried about being beaten. They have hardly been engaged yet, let alone beaten, so a ceasefire is a long way off.
#3
Hamas will NEVER agree to a permanent cease-fire. They can't even adhere to a temporary one. Wasted time and breath trying to get an agreement from them.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
01/08/2009 18:54
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The Taliban in Mirali tehsil of North Waziristan Agency on Wednesday killed two Afghan nationals after accusing them of spying for the United States. Locals found the body of Habibullah at Khadi, 15 kilometres west of Mirali near Mirali-Miranshah Road. The body of the second Afghan, identified as Khan Muhammad Babar, was found in Shera Talla area, 20 kilometres from Mirali on Mirali-Tall Road. Notes found near the bodies said the people spying for the US would be dealt with in the same manner. Meanwhile, police in Swat district found an unidentified body in Kabal tehsil early on Wednesday. The incident follows the recovery of six bodies in the district on Tuesday, three of the deceased were reportedly soldiers.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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ISTANBUL, Jan 7 (Reuters) - Somali pirates released a Turkish cargo ship hijacked in October after its owners paid a ransom, Turkey's Anatolian news agency said on Wednesday.
The MV Yasa Neslihan was en route to China on Wednesday after pirates freed it in the Gulf of Aden off the coast of Somalia, Anatolian said, citing Fehmi Ulgener, a lawyer for the Yasa shipping company which owns the vessel. Yasa officials had been negotiating with the ship's captors for its release and had paid an undisclosed amount of money as ransom, Ulgener told the news agency. The 20 Turkish crew were all safe, he said.
The Marshall Island-flagged Neslihan was carrying 77,000 tonnes of iron ore from Canada to China when pirates seized the ship in the Gulf of Aden in late October.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/08/2009
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#1
When is somebody gonna stomp on these cock-a-roaches?
Peace brokers proclaimed a breakthrough Wednesday in efforts to halt the Gaza conflict as Israel warmed to a Franco-Egyptian initiative.
Israel stopped short of saying whether the plan floated late Tuesday by the presidents of Egypt and France after a summit by the Red Sea would be accepted as a basis on which to end its 12-day-old campaign in Gaza where nearly 700 people have been killed.
However its chief spokesman said Israel viewed the initiative positively, prompting French President Nicolas Sarkozy to hail its "acceptance" by Israel and the head of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas to say he was willing to go to Egypt for more talks.
Egypt is also to invite Palestinian factions, including Hamas and Abbas's rival Fatah movement, to a fresh round of reconciliation talks.
The Israeli military called a three-hour halt to its bombing of Gaza in the afternoon to allow aid to reach the territory, prompting Hamas fighters to also hold their fire and allowing embattled Gazans to venture outside to shop for food. Clashes resumed after its expiry, however.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
Peace brokers?
Is there really much of a market? What's the going price per peace?
Seven members of Zimbabwe's main opposition party were the first of dozens of jailed dissidents to be formally charged Wednesday, and they pleaded not guilty in a bombing plot.
The seven are among rights activists and opposition party members detained in recent weeks in what the opposition calls a crackdown on dissent. They were charged with terrorism, banditry and insurgency, and could face the death penalty if convicted.
They include Gandi Mudzingwa, an adviser to Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai; and Chris Dhlamini, head of security for Tsvangirai's party.
Lawyer Alec Muchadehama, who entered the not guilty pleas on behalf of his clients, told the judge the charges were "ridiculous and scandalous."
He also called two doctors who testified the defendants had been beaten while in police custody and had serious injuries. Muchadehama asked the judge to allow the defendants to be further examined outside jail to determine whether they had been tortured.
The prosecutors argued that the two doctors' testimony was not credible. The judge was expected to rule Thursday on the request for further medical examination.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
Cohlera? What Cholera? quick look this way at the noise, pay no attention to all those rotting corpses.
Posted by: Rednek Jim ||
01/08/2009 17:01
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Militants who attacked Mumbai were urged to kill their hostages in cold blood and fight to the death in the name of Islam, according to transcripts of intercepted telephone calls made public yesterday.
In one exchange, one of the two attackers who stormed the luxury Oberoi-Trident hotel was told to "inflict the maximum damage" and to "kill all hostages, except the two Muslims" they were holding.
"We have three foreigners, including women," the attacker identified as Fahadullah said.
"Kill them. Keep your phone switched on so that we can hear the gunfire," he was told.
The transcript then said the two attackers were heard to tell the two Muslims to step aside and order the hostages to stand in a line. Gunfire was heard, then cheering.
Details of the attackers' conversations, allegedly with their six "Pakistan-based handlers," are contained in a dossier of evidence that India says "unmistakenly" points to elements in Pakistan being behind the attacks. The document, obtained by The Hindu, an English-language newspaper, puts the official death toll at 165 civilians and security personnel -- two more than previously -- plus nine of the 10 attackers.
It also lists items recovered after the attacks, including Pakistan-made weapons and global positioning systems with co-ordinates of a sea route from off southeast Pakistan, as well as Pakistani washing powder and shaving cream. Much of the detail has emerged piecemeal since the 60-hour siege ended on November 29, including claims that the banned Pakistan-based Islamist group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) trained and equipped the militants and financed the operation.
Islamabad has angrily rejected allegations from Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that the attacks had the support of some "official agencies" and that Pakistan used terrorism as an "instrument of state policy."
India's Defence Minister A.K. Anthony maintained the pressure Wednesday, expressing concern that there was "no serious attempt" to disband the 30 "terror outfits" that were working across the border.
The head of Pakistan's powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency, Lieutenant General Ahmad Shuja Pasha, earlier told Der Spiegel magazine in an interview that it was fighting terrorism, not India. "We may be crazy in Pakistan, but not completely out of our minds. We know full well that terror is our enemy, not India," he was quoted as saying in the German publication's online edition.
He also rejected claims that ISI-sponsored Pakistani groups were behind the attacks, accusing India of giving them "nothing, no names, no numbers, no connections."
The dossier -- a 13-page summary and 50 pages of supporting documents -- contains phone numbers and email addresses allegedly linked to LeT commanders.
According to the transcript, one of the two attackers at the Nariman House Jewish cultural centre was told: "Brother, you have to fight. This is a matter of prestige of Islam.
"Fight so that your fight becomes a shining example. Be strong in the name of Allah... Brother, you have to fight for the victory of Islam. Be strong."
A separate call added: "Keep in mind that the hostages are of use only as long as you do not come under fire because of their safety.
"If you are still threatened, then don't saddle yourself with the burden of the hostages, immediately kill them."
The caller went on: "If the hostages are killed, it will spoil relations between India and Israel."
An attacker replied: "So be it, God willing."
Five hostages, including a rabbi and his wife, were later found dead with the two militants.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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CHICAGO An Illinois House committee might decide as soon as Thursday whether to recommend the impeachment of Gov. Rod Blagojevich, says Rep. Barbara Flynn Currie, the panel's chairperson.
"The House might act soon after that," Currie, a Democrat, said in an interview Wednesday. If the full House votes to impeach, the Illinois Senate would hold a trial to decide whether Blagojevich should be removed from office.
Blagojevich was arrested Dec. 9 on federal bribery and conspiracy charges. He was accused of trying to sell the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Barack Obama.
Roland Burris, who was appointed to the seat by Blagojevich on Dec. 30, is scheduled to appear before the committee today. State Rep. Jim Durkin, the panel's Republican spokesman, said in an interview that he wants to explore the circumstances of Burris' appointment. Burris and Blagojevich are Democrats.
"This appointment is tainted," Durkin said. "It's our duty to the people of the state to investigate the circumstances."
Burris submitted an affidavit to the committee this week saying he was approached by one of Blagojevich's lawyers on Dec. 26 about taking the Senate post and accepted two days later in a phone call with the governor.
Currie said Burris' testimony is not vital to the committee's conclusions about Blagojevich's conduct. "The affidavit says nothing of value exchanged hands," Currie said. Because Burris was appointed after the governor's arrest, she said, "you'd have to be nuts to think that any quids or quos were offered."
The timetable for a vote might be affected by a court hearing Thursday on the release of four tape-recorded conversations in which Blagojevich allegedly said he would not sign a bill benefiting the horse-racing industry unless he received $100,000 in campaign contributions.
U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald asked Chief U.S. District Judge James Holderman to release the discussions, which were captured by federal wiretaps, to the impeachment committee. If it appears that there will be a long legal fight over the tapes, Currie said, the committee might decide "that we have enough to go forward without them."
Durkin said the tapes will be key if there is a Senate trial. "It is a continuing duty upon us to pursue the tapes," he said. "I want the best evidence."
On Wednesday, the committee discussed a previously confidential 2004 report by the governor's inspector general outlining alleged hiring irregularities by Blagojevich's administration.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/08/2009
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#1
They're in the "haw" stage of hemming and hawing.
The Leader of the Islamic Revolution has condemned the Israeli military attacks on Gaza which has so far left 282 people dead. In a condolence message released on Sunday, Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei denounced Israel, describing its attacks as a "deliberate massacre" of innocent and defenseless civilians.
"What pain greater than Muslim silence on this humanitarian tragedy?" the Leader asked, lamenting the lack of world action on the issue. "Instead of standing up to Israeli war crimes and defending innocent Gazans, some Muslim leaders have paved the way for Tel Aviv to commit these crimes against humanity," he continued.
Ayatollah Khamenei said the contributions of the Bush administration toward the "genocidal Israeli assaults" against Palestinians have further tarnished the US image and world standing.
The UN Security Council has been unable to force an end to Israeli attacks against Gaza due to the intervention of the United States. Washington once again used its veto powers on Sunday to block a resolution calling for an end to the massive ongoing attacks against the impoverished region. The US, a staunch ally to Israel, has so far vetoed over 40 anti-Israeli resolutions sought by the council since 1972.
According to Ayatollah Khamenei, those who masterminded the "abysmal catastrophe" should be personally tried and met with severe reprimand. Monday has been declared by the Leader as a day of national mourning.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
Who'd know what genocide is better than Muslims?
Annual processions mourning the death of Hussein [Ashura which began Jan 7 2009] became common in the eighth century, but self-mutilation did not become part of the ritual until the 15th century. A piece of apocrypha explains the practice: According to some, Hussein's sister Zainab, overcome with grief at the sight of her brother's severed head, banged her head bloody against her saddle post.
Variations in method and degree of brutality exist. Some older Muslims accept self-flagellation but feel it has become too showy and gruesome: The modern zanjeer blades have two sharp edges rather than one, drawing much more blood than the traditional versions. Some participants shun the blades altogether and use the chains alone. Many South Asian Shiites hold razors between their fingers while slapping their chests. Individual mourners have developed altogether novel practices, including hanging weights from a body piercing.
Ayatollah Khamenei of Iran issued a fatwa against self-mutilation in 1994, and Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq's most prominent cleric, has issued statements suggesting ambivalence about the practice. Some flagellation enthusiasts rejected the pronouncements entirely or claimed they prohibited only the cutting of the scalp with swords. Others accepted the fatwa and redirected their efforts toward more socially productive acts like Ashura blood drives. Over time, most clerics have muted their criticism, as many Shiites' devotion to the practice has been too strong to break.
#3
Is this mainly a Shiite thing? Or can other Muslems get in on the fun, too?
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
01/08/2009 8:25
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It's entirely a Shiite thing - Ashura's about Shiite martyrs. In this little passion play, the Sunnis are Pilate and the Sanhedrin.
including hanging weights from a body piercing.
Sounds like Masochistic Mondays at the fetish club to me.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
01/08/2009 11:07
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#5
If you have ever seen pics of the scalp cutting of children, it would get you to wonder about their so called religion. In this country you would be arrested for child abuse..........well in some places still, I hope.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
01/08/2009 11:55
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Recalls the monks flagellant of the early middle ages.... as usual, Islam is about 1000 years behind the curve.
Israel has urged residents in southern Gaza to evacuate the area, as the Israeli army mulls over ground assaults into populated cities.
The Israeli air force dropped leaflets in and around the southern Gaza town of Rafah on Wednesday, urging residents to evacuate their homes. The Israeli army "demands those who live (in the areas bordering Egypt) to leave their houses. You have until 20:00 (1800 GMT)", the leaflets said.
The Israeli military says it is going to target the area on suspicion that it is being "used by terrorists to (dig) tunnels and to stock up" on arms.
The spokesman for the UNWRA, Chris Gunness, called the warning useless as there are no safe havens in Gaza. What is the use of getting a leaflet that says; "Leave your house. It's about to be attacked. Go to safety," when there in no safe place in Gaza, Gunness said.
The vast network of tunnels between the two sides of the Rafah border crossing has been used to import rockets, grenades and ammunition fuel, food and medicine since Israel tightened its blockade of Gaza in November, leaving Rafah as the territory's only connection to the outside world.
The Israeli warnings come shortly after the Israeli security cabinet approved the expansion of ground offensive into the Gaza Strip to push deeper into populated areas of the coastal sliver.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
The spokesman for the UNWRA, Chris Gunness, called the warning useless as there are no safe havens in Gaza. What is the use of getting a leaflet that says; "Leave your house. It's about to be attacked. Go to safety," when there in no safe place in Gaza, Gunness said.
Palestinian eye witnesses said they saw IDF tanks heading towards the town of Khan Yunis in the Gaza Strip, British Sky News reported late on Wednesday night.
In the southern city of Rafah, Palestinians reported that the IAF struck a house and a tunnel, Israel Radio reported. Sky News quoted Palestinians in Rafah as saying the IAF had targeted a mosque, killing 15 people.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
So, when will we hear that Haniya is enjoying white risins?
The Pakistan-based handlers of the Mumbai terrorists ordered the murders of civilians over the phone and cheered after hearing the gunfire, according to the dossier of evidence India provided to the Pakistani government.
The documents, obtained by the Indian newspaper The Hindu, provides a cold, calculating, and chilling look at the masterminds behind the late November military-style assault on the Indian financial capital of Mumbai. More than 170 people were killed and hundreds wounded during the 60 hour terror spree that shut down the city. The Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistan-based terror group allied with al Qaeda and supported by powerful elements within Pakistans Inter-Service Intelligence agency and the military, carried out the attack.
Six Pakistani handlers monitored the news coverage from Mumbai and kept in constant touch with the terrorists holed up in Nariman House and the Taj Mahal and Trident hotels during the three day siege. The handlers are identified as Zarar, Kafa, Wassi, Jundal, Bururg, and Major General.
#1
Damn if even one half of the Mumbai terrorists slaughter went down as Bill Roggio reported here, then clearly the Anti-Western Islamic Animals are in charge of the ISI and in charge of Pakistan's "Civilian" Government also.
The tough questions for US are, How do we handle/control Pakistan's' Nukes... their **** their Talib support***** their sabotage of A-Stan ***** their support of al-Qaeda***** and their support of their Home Grown Islamists?
.
Posted by: Red Dawg ||
01/08/2009 1:38
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A senior US military intelligence official familiar with the dossier said that the "Major General" is indeed Hamid Gul, the retired former chief of the ISI. "It's Gul," the official told The Long War Journal. "This is why the US is trying to get him on the UN list of terrorists." In December 2008 the US attempted to get Hamid Gul and other former military and intelligence officials added to the UN list of designated terrorists but has so far been rebuffed.
Maybe after Pakistan gets it's $16 billion from Joe Biden, it might ask Gul to stop being a naughty boy
Police have arrested four foreigners near Pakistan's border with Iran on suspicion of links with international terrorists, sources said on Wednesday.
According to the sources, Panjgur Police believed the four men were members of Al Qaeda who entered Pakistan via Afghanistan and were planning to go to Iran to pursue terrorist activities.
The raid was conducted in Tasp town of Panjgur to arrest two Turkish nationals and two Azerbaijan nationals, a Panjgur-based police official said on condition of anonymity. All four suspects were immediately handed over to investigation agencies and shifted to Quetta, he added.
The suspects claimed to have come to Pakistan to acquire religious education, although according to police, it seemed they wanted to cross the border into Iran.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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Islamabad's acknowledgement that the lone surviving Mumbai gunman Ajmal Kasab is a Pakistani shows that it is sincere in probing the attacks, PML-Q Secretary General Mushahid Hussain said on Wednesday. More like they couldn't come up with any more reasons, no matter how far fetched, for him not to be a Pak.
Talking to a private TV channel, Hussain said US pressure was one of the reasons behind the Indian move to share its evidence with Pakistan, and that an agreement on the identity of Kasab would help defuse the tensions that India had heightened unnecessarily. "But the war of words will continue," he said, "because Indian political parties have election campaigns on their hands."
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
"But the war of words will continue," he said, "because Indian political parties have election campaigns on their hands."
And Islamabad is full of folks that will cut off their elected officials' heads.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
01/08/2009 18:31
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India's state minister for external affairs has urged Pakistan to "own the nationality of all the Mumbai attackers" and act against "the organisations responsible for the attacks", a private TV channel reported. Joint investigations into the Mumbai attacks would not be meaningful if Pakistan did not honour the commitments it had made, the minister, Anand Sharma, said while talking to reporters in New Delhi. He urged Pakistan not to be "in a state of denial" saying this was "neither in the interest of regional peace nor in that of Pakistan".
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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The ongoing dispute over transit fees and pricing has halted Russian natural gas exports to Europe. Ukraine and Russia blame each other for the disruption that has curtailed vital gas deliveries to several European countries, including Hungary, Romania, Austria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. Amid freezing temperatures and usage restrictions, the Japanese automaker Suzuki says it is halting production at its Hungarian affiliate.
The European Union says it is being held hostage to a bilateral dispute and is demanding an immediate resolution of the matter. On Wednesday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed displeasure in telephone conversations with Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and Ukraine's Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko. Germany gets some 37 percent of its natural gas from Russia, 80 percent of that through pipelines that transit Ukraine.
Russia claims that Ukraine is $2 billion in arrears in gas payments. It accuses Ukraine of siphoning off gas intended for Central and Western Europe. Gazprom, the Russian gas supplier and the world's biggest energy company, wants Ukraine to pay world market prices - more than double what Ukraine has been paying. Ukraine, in turn, wants Russia to pay more in transit fees.
Three years ago, an almost identical dispute briefly disrupted natural gas trans-shipments.
Thomas Mayer, chief European economist at Deutsche Bank, expects the dispute will be resolved soon. He told Bloomberg Television that neither country wants to damage its commercial ties with Europe. Mayer foresees no significant shortages in Western Europe. "I think there is the possibility for the European Union to share reserves among the European Union countries," said Mayer. "So at the present time, I don't think one needs to be too worried about it. And I think the markets are also not taking a lot of fright from that."
Mayer says that, so far, the shortages are not acute in Germany, which is still obtaining some Russian gas through the pipeline that crosses Belarus.
Several politicians and energy experts say this latest supply disruption reveals that Western Europe has become too dependent on Russia for natural gas and oil. They say that dependence is likely to grow with a planned pipeline from Russia to Germany under the Baltic Sea.
Russia, meanwhile, is expanding its pipeline network to allow greater oil and gas exports to fast-growing China and India.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/08/2009
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#1
Here it is, finally. We've always talked about this but now it is here in full force. Western Europe is going to blame someone for making the gas stop...will it be Russia, or Ukraine? And if they take the easy way out and blame Ukraine, guess who will pay the $2B? (hint: Ukraine doesn't have $2B)
If once you have paid him the Danegeld, you never get rid of the Dane.
#2
It looks to me like much of western Europe will submit to Russian demands. If I lived in one of those countries, I'd be checking my alternatives. Maybe it's time to leave.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
01/08/2009 8:19
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Anyone care to discuss the effectiveness and virtue of soft power? Anyone? Bueller?
BRUSSELS, Belgium Russia and Ukraine backed off from their energy war Thursday, promising to start resending Russian gas over Ukrainian pipelines to EU customers shivering through a widespread cold snap.
European Union governments have blasted both countries, saying it was unacceptable to see homes unheated and businesses closing due to gas shortages because neither Russia or Ukraine could stick to their supply contracts.
Russia's state-owned Gazprom and Ukraine's Naftogaz were in talks on Thursday for the first time since payment negotiations broke off on New Year's Eve. The companies and officials from the two nations said they were willing to start pumping gas to Europe and would accept having monitors check on the gas flow but they were less confident about solving the root causes of the dispute.
"We don't want war, (a) propaganda gas war," Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Hryhoriy Nemyrya told reporters, saying Naftogaz would need around 36 hours to restore supplies.
Gazprom and Naftogaz continued to blame each other during visits Thursday to Brussels. Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller suggested that countries that believe they have suffered from the gas cutoff could sue Ukraine. And Naftogaz chief executive Oleh Dubina complained that Gazprom was charging Belarus far less for gas than Ukraine. Other Ukrainian officials alleged Russia was trying to destroy Naftogaz and the Ukrainian economy during the global financial meltdown.
One key issue is still far from resolved: Russian allegations that Ukraine siphoned off Russian gas to Europe for its own needs without paying for it. Dubina said that Naftogaz needed to use this 'technical gas' to maintain pressure in the pipeline to get gas west to Europe.
Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Barrister Shafique Ahmed yesterday said his ministry will take steps to restore the 1972 constitution in order to reestablish the spirits of secularism, the great liberation war, rule of law, human rights and democracy in the country.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
I'd like to see the US restore its constitution.
An Egyptian court dismissed Monday a divorce lawsuit filed by a Coptic wife against her husband, who recently converted to Islam.
In the first ruling of its kind, the Cairo Personal Status Court refused to grant Laila Hanna a divorce from her husband based on the principle of "no harm, no foul," a judiciary source told AlArabiya.net.
"The fact that the Christian husband converted to Islam does not invalidate the marriage contract since Islam allows the marriage of Muslim men to Christian women," he said.
Let's try it the other way and see how the court rules ...
This is applicable as long as no harm was inflicted on the wife as a result of the conversion. Hanna's lawsuit, filed almost a year ago, did not mention any afflictions. On the contrary, Hanna said her husband treats her well.
The reason she cited for seeking a divorce was that the marriage contract was ecclesiastic and was signed by members of the Christian clergy. She said this was enough to annul the contract since marrying a Muslim requires two Muslim witnesses.
"The court goes by the purpose of the contract back when the husband was Christian," the verdict said. "The fact that the husband converted does not invalidate this."
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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A website has defended a message urging British Muslims to contact prominent British Jews to protest at the Israeli attacks on Gaza. The post was made during a discussion on Ummah, an Islamic internet forum. A member suggested that people who featured a list of influential Jews - including David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary - should be reminded of the plight of the Palestinian people.
Among other prominent Jews featured on the list were Lord Levy, the pop music producer Mark Ronson, the lawyer Anthony Julius, and the businessman and television personality Alan Sugar.
A link to the list, which was first published by the Jewish Chronicle newspaper, was posted by a member of the forum using the name Saladin1970. He wrote: "It would be beneficial to start compiling a list so that we can write polite letters reminding them of the injustices of Israel and to stop supporting Israel."
After some discussion, another member, using the name Abuislam, asked: "Have we got list of top Jews and supporters yet we can target? Can someone start posting names and addresses."
Saladin1970 later replied: "The best thing to do is not to contact them directly", adding that Muslim groups should boycott those named and connected businesses.
A spokesman for the website denied claims made in a newspaper report that the post represented a "Hate hit list" and that it encouraged readers to attack those named. He claimed that an examination of the website's records showed that the username Abuislam was registered to a freelance journalist, whose real name was known to them and who had "decided to pose as a Muslim to make Muslims look bad".
Abraham. Posing as a Muslim. Like, "Hymie" wasn't available. Jeez.
In a statement, he said: "Like most Muslims, and a great number of non-Muslims across the world, many of our users are currently engaged in various kinds of protest and campaigning against the massacre of Palestinian civilians by the Israeli Forces.
"Clearly, most people will realise that this thread is about a peaceful form of campaigning against the state of Israel by writing 'polite' letters to well-known and wealthy supporters of the state asking them to withdraw that support and encouraging Muslims not to do business nor work with them until they do."
He told The Daily Telegraph that any messages endorsing attacks against Jews "would be immediately removed" from the site, on which a large number of Islamist, anti-Israeli and anti-Zionist messages were found to be on display on Wednesday afternoon.
Earlier a report by the Community Security Trust, which gives safety advice to British Jews, said there had been an increase in the number of anti-Semitic incidents since the start of the conflict.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/08/2009
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President-elect Barack Obama said today that reforming massive government entitlement programs -- such as Social Security and Medicare -- would be "a central part" of his effort to control federal spending.
Obama made the pledge but provided few details as he named Nancy Killefer as his administration's chief performance officer, creating a new White House position aimed at eliminating government waste and improving efficiency.
Noting that the Congressional Budget Office had just estimated he would inherit a $1.2 trillion federal deficit for fiscal 2009, Obama promised to cut unnecessary spending. "We expect that discussion around entitlements will be a part, a central part of those plans," Obama said. "And I would expect that by February in line with the announcement of at least a rough budget outline we will have more to say about how we're going to approach entitlement spending."
For the first time, Obama gave a ballpark price tag for his massive economic plan aimed at generating jobs and jolting the country out of recession. Aides have said it could cost as much as $775 billion over two years. Outside economists have suggested as much as $1.2 trillion would be needed.
"We expect that it will be on the high end of our estimates but will not be as high as some economists have recommended because of the constraint and concerns we have about the existing deficit," Obama said.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
The SS/Medicare third rail. This could get interesting.
Only insofar as I'm going to guess that Obama's decided to ignore the private investment option and is just going to jack up the needed taxes.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
01/08/2009 5:47
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#3
There is basically no way that Obama can avoid slashing both SS and Medicare. Tax revenues are going to be in the toilet, and almost half of it is already spent on the big three, SS, Medicare and Medicaid.
And yes, Defense is going to take it in the shorts as well. No way around it.
I'm sure it will involve "the collective good" or some other lefty slogan that gets his supporters all hot and bothered, and will be promoted as further proof of his genius.
#6
I don't see this actually happening until the train wreck is upon us. Congress won't touch So. Sec. reform until they can't dither any longer. And dithering is still possible no matter how certain the wreck will be.
#7
Over 2,000,000 people who DO work, lost their jobs this year. That's got to put Tax revs in the crapper.
So Bambi and the sh*tballs in DC will of course punish people who have already worked all their lives and live on a pittance so they can hand more money to people who have not, nor ever will work and pay taxes.
Bravo! I don't find the notion of a suitcase nuke going off in DC nearly as horrifying as I used to.
In 4 more years, I doubt I'll find it all that worrisome at all at the rate we're going.
#8
While I may agree that something has to happen with regards these programs, if Obamba touches this, he's going to find his ass on fire, just like GWB. The one rising quickest is Medicaid. Choke it. But then again, if he forces thru national health care, Medicaid isn't needed, but the outalys from Treasury will be 100 times as much. He has larger problems than he knows, but curtailing SS/Medicare will ignite a firestorm. He better think along the lines of cutting foreign aid to zero. Nothing to UN. Taxpayers favor this. Having the rug pulled out from under them at the time of life when they are most vulnerable is not going to be palatable.
#9
"Reform" does not necessarily mean benefit cuts.
To the Democratic party "Budget reform" is tax increases, "Stimulus" is trillion dollar deficits, "Medicare reform" is squeezing doctors and drug companies, and "social security reform" has always been higher payroll taxes.
#11
DoDo,
And when that doesn't work: Benefit Cuts.
I think they'll start out trying to pinch the business end, but they'll find that too hard and just grease the old folks eventually.
#17
They told me that if George Bush was elected Social Security would be cut. Only they didn't tell me it would be after he left office.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
01/08/2009 19:31
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#18
Wait a minute, "The One" has promised every American the same health care coverage the congress enjoys.
He said he'll find the money by getting the doctors to computerise their medical records.
Maybe they can farm out their office staff work to India.
A patient walks into an empty doctor's office.
A voice says this is Sally in Mumbai, please sign in and the doctor will see you in a minute.
Later a voice is heard, Hello I'm nurse Joan in Mumbai, please take the blood pressure kit from the table and test yourself. When you are finished type the results into the computer.
Still later, a voice says, Hello, I'm doctor Elizabeth in Mumbai. Please approach the video cam on the computer, open your mouth and say aah. Very interesting, take two aspirin and call back if it doesn't get any better.
Finally a voice says, please swipe your National Health Insurance card in the reader at the door and it automatically open and let you out.
#19
All he has to do is take everyone 401K and IRA and place it in to a Government Social Security like Ponzi scheme and he'll have a huge bankroll of money to spend as he see's fit.
And with mandatory contributions your grandkids will pay for it - just like they're be paying for your social security.
Individuals and organisations guilty of the terrorist attacks in Mumbai should be named and punished, in a free, fair and impartial investigation and prosecution, intellectuals from India and Pakistan said in a joint statement on Wednesday.
The statement said intellectuals from both the countries understood and shared the anger of the people over the attacks, adding that there was a dire need to eliminate terrorism that had impacted the entire South Asian region and threatened a peaceful co-existence of the people of the region.
The group of Indian and Pakistani intellectuals, who met in Delhi in the past two days, appreciated the restraint exercised by New Delhi following calls for reprisal from within India. In the statement, they appreciated the Indian government's readiness and determination to discourage hasty conclusions concerning the nature and extent of the involvement, if any, of the Pakistani state, urging it to refrain from taking any steps which would weaken the bonds that had developed between the civil societies of the two countries over the past five years.
The statement said war was not an option and all talk of partial or targeted action was ill-informed and dangerous given that both the countries were nuclear-armed.
Peace process: In the statement, the Indo-Pak intellectuals said they believed it was necessary for the two governments to resume the peace process. They welcomed the statement made by Indian External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee in Srinagar that India-Pakistan dialogue in the context of Kashmir would not be affected.
They said the recent elections in Indian-held Kashmir provided encouraging signals including a high turnout and the deliberate eschewing of violence by terrorists.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
To say that war is not an option is to give up. War has to stay on the table if India wants to retain any hope of getting those thugs.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
01/08/2009 8:43
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Oil futures tumbled 12 percent, the most in more than seven years, after a U.S. government report showed bigger-than-expected increases in supplies of crude oil, gasoline and distillate fuel as consumption dropped.
Inventories of crude oil rose 6.68 million barrels to 325.4 million barrels last week, the highest since May, the Energy Department said today in a weekly report. Supplies were forecast to increase by 800,000 barrels, according to the median of forecasts by 14 analysts in a Bloomberg News survey.
"We have the making of a huge glut here," said Phil Flynn, senior trader at Alaron Trading Corp. in Chicago. "Supplies are more than adequate and should continue to rise because demand is so poor."
Crude oil for February delivery fell $5.95 to $42.63 a barrel at 2:46 p.m. on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the lowest settlement since Dec. 30. Today's decline was the biggest since Sept. 24, 2001. Futures on the exchange are down 55 percent from a year ago.
Inventories at Cushing, Oklahoma, where oil that's traded on Nymex is stored, climbed 14 percent to 32.2 million barrels last week, the highest since at least April 2004, when the department began keeping track of supplies there.
"We're pushing up toward capacity limits," said Lawrence Eagles, global head of commodities research at JPMorgan Chase & Co. in New York. "There's still a bit of space, but not much."
And the oil companies thus will curtail exploration, so that in 2013 when President Palin is inaugurated gas prices will surge and she'll be blamed ...
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
...Gas prices blew out the roof here in SC over the last few days - 30 to 35 cents a gallon since the weekend. Hopefully that's gonna change.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
01/08/2009 5:42
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This all is a good reminder that a significate part of our gas useage is discretionary. Most of us can take a few less trips, ride poll and such to save money when gas costs are up. As consumers, we can all do ourselves a favor by staying away from the pump as much as we can, for awhile. Maybe we can break a few of those bastards we ran the price up so high on us. Maybe, we can continue looking at and developing alternatives. But then maybe we'll just clim back on the same old roller coaster.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
01/08/2009 8:11
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#3
I bought a car that gets 40 MPG Hwy. Started planning and consolidating all my trips/errands, work from home or a closer facility (Network Admin) when I can. Cut my fuel consumption 70%, and I know several other colleagues that have done the same. Americans can adapt when they have too.
#4
Mike, gas prices have risen recently in Virginia, too (and I suspect the rest of the states).
A spokesguy for a Va. gasoline dealers association said it was due to the Israel-Hamas war. He didn't explain why a war between two countries (actually, a country and a bunch of idiots) that produce no oil would affect oil/gas prices. And of course the "reporter" interviewing him didn't ask.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
01/08/2009 13:55
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Hamas has rejected an Egyptian proposal to place the Rafah border crossing under forces loyal to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Hamas officials said Wednesday.
Hamas also rejected an Egyptian proposal to deploy international troops in the Gaza Strip in the context of a new cease-fire agreement with Israel, the officials added. The Egyptian proposals are backed by a number of Arab and EU countries, they said.
Hamas officials, meanwhile, continued to issue contradictory statements regarding their readiness to reach a new cease-fire with Israel. Hamas leaders in Syria and Lebanon said they would not agree to a long-term truce because they wanted to "preserve the right to respond to Israeli violations and aggression."
But their colleagues in the Gaza Strip sounded more optimistic. Ahmed Yussef, an adviser to Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, said he did not rule out the possibility of reaching a cease-fire agreement "within 48 hours." He said Hamas would stop firing rockets at Israel once the IDF halted its military operation in the Gaza Strip.
Yussef added that any cease-fire agreement should include the reopening of the border crossings and an end to the blockade of the Gaza Strip.
In Cairo, Egyptian Intelligence Chief Gen. Omar Suleiman met with Hamas representatives to discuss the latest proposals and ways of ending the violence in the Gaza Strip. Suleiman reportedly told the Hamas delegation - whose members included Imadal-Alami and Muhammad Nasser - that Egypt would not reopen the Rafah border crossing unless Abbas's forces were allowed to return to the terminal.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
Hamas also rejected an Egyptian proposal to deploy international troops in the Gaza Strip in the context of a new cease-fire agreement with Israel, the officials added. The Egyptian proposals are backed by a number of Arab and EU countries, they said.
I think Hamas boxed themselves into a corner. Egypt and the Euros have already put a reasonable offer on the table, Israel can now say they accept it fully. If Hamas continues to reject it, they justify the op continuing. If they accept it, they look like losers - not only have they done poorly on the ground, not only have the accepted Fatah back into the Strip, but they have accepted what they just rejected. If France and Egypt change their proposal, Israel can reject that with less opprobrium.
It seems like Hamas still thinks it can win on the ground, by either a real big Qana type event, by a kidnapping event, or by big IDF casualties. So far they are failing on the latter two, and even the former isn't playing well enough to give them a win.
basically I agree but one other area of interest is the rocket attacks
I think there were about 25-30 yesterday from Gaza which is down from the 70+ before the IAF air operation began and down from 50+ when the IDF ground ops began. If the IDF can knock out enough Hamas launch teams (or the teams run out of stuff or their stuff breaks down) to get that down below, say, five (with none of them Grads), Hamas will look like a loser to the faithful.
#4
right now Hamas' only strength is Fatahs weakness. If Israel presses Hamas too hard, Hamas falls.
Who takes over the strip next? Israel doesnt want to. Egypt doesnt want to. Fatah DOES want to, but they didnt do such a great job before, and it could be a mess again. Barak apparently really DOES not want Hamas gone, he wants them to cry uncle and give Israel a win, after which they can leave Gaza showing themselves teh strong horse. Livni, often thought of as a dove, seems to be taking a harder line toward the ceasefire initiative (this per an oped in todays Haaretz) My read is thats cause she has closer ties to Abbas than Barak, and is more willing to make a bet on Fatah control of the Strip.
#6
How about letting Fatah have south Gaza, say, within 2 miles of Rafah which would include the Yasser Arafat International Airport, the rafah crossing and Kerem Shalom crossing. Let Hamas have the rest.
#7
hmmm. Maybe. Would that be stable though? Would Hamas reconstituted not try to push out Fatah from anyplace where Egyptian/international troops didnt protect them? OTOH if Hamas is unable to reconstitute strongly wont Hamas fall - to a Fatah that craves the rest of the strip, but also to every from Islamic Jihad, to Al Qaeeda, to the Dogmush and other clans? IE chaos.
#9
My solution was designed to give Egypt two borders regions close to each other which gives them double the opportunity for graft while minimizing the number of troops they have to use to keep the graft going.
#10
Im not convinced graft is a big issue. To be crude, why would Mubarak endanger his graft in Cairo and Alexandria and Suez (IE his RULE) for peanuts from the Gaza border? Hamas IS tied to the muslim brotherhood and it DOES endanger his rule. If he hasnt stopped smuggling, its either cause he cant, or cause of some political game hes playing.
#12
Egypt could close the tunnels in an afternoon with 200 troops. The fact they haven't is to allow Mubarack to claim he is doing all he can for the Gazans.
The mystery is why he allows the free flow of weapons into Gaza. You can't exactly hide a Grad rocket in your sock when you go through customs.
Arming Gaza means arming the Sinai bedouin and probably the Muslim Brotherhood as well. That is some extremly dangerous fire Mubarack is playing with.
#13
If he hasnt stopped smuggling, its either cause he cant, or cause of some political game hes playing
I would conjecture that permitting the smuggling is essentially a make-work programme for the Bedouin. It keeps them happy by earning a bit of money. The Egyptian economy, albeit underground to an extent, makes money. The goods and weapons are outbound for Gaza instead of into Egypt. The tourists are not being slain.
A wooden boat with nearly 200 people on board was found drifting off the northern tip of Indonesias Sumatra island Wednesday, officials said. The boat, with 19 people from Bangladesh and 174 from Myanmar on board, was found at sea by fishermen off Sabang island in Aceh province, local navy commander Yanuar Handwiyono said.
Those on board the boat were weak after being adrift for around one week, Handwiyono said. Some 79 passengers are being treated in two separate hospitals in Sabang town for dehydration, he said.
All of those on the boat were men and none of them spoke Indonesian or English.
The passengers were believed to be en route to Malaysia to seek a better life, Aceh police spokesman Farid Ahmad said. The police had referred the boat passengers case to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees and local immigration authorities, he said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/08/2009
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Defense Minister Ehud Barak met with Javier Solana, the European Union's foreign policy chief, in Tel Aviv on Wednesday. Barak and Solana discussed the latest events, as well as the expected developments in the Gaza Strip, the Defense Ministry said. "Our intentions are that the operation will create a safer reality for our residents in the South. We will not renounce this goal. In order to reach it we will make every political effort and every military action," Barak told Solana.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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Israel has started the shelling of the populated border region of Rafah amid an escalated Israeli military incursion into southern Gaza. The military forces stepped up attacks on the southern Gaza Strip late Wednesday, destroying at least 30 homes The Jerusalem Post reported.
The Army claims the operation was aimed at destroying "smuggling tunnels" in the border crossing. It vowed to continue the attacks through the night, the Israeli channel 10 reported.
The military had earlier dropped flyers on Rafah calling on residents to evacuate the area. "Because Hamas uses your houses to hide and smuggle military weapons, the IDF will attack the area, between the Egyptian border and the beach road," the leaflet said, according a local UN official.
Tel Aviv has launched Operation Cast Lead against the Gaza Strip December 27, bringing the densely populated area under a full-scale aerial, naval and ground offensive. The military operation has so far claimed at least 710 lives and left over 3,100 others wounded.
Earlier on Tuesday, Israeli warplanes bombed 3 schools run by the UN agency for Palestinian refugees in the Gaza Strip. The attack left at least 48 people who had taken refuge inside the schools killed.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
I am making signs for the pro-Israel, anti-Hamass rally planned in my local community this Sunday.
I am making a sign that says "Hamas = Al-Qaeda" and "God Commands All to Bless Israel..Genesis 12:3."
Three decades to the day after the fall of Cambodia's Khmer Rouge regime, the country finally received word of a possible starting date for the trial of one of its key leaders.
International co-prosecutor Robert Petit said that Kaing Khek Iev, who was better known as Duch when he headed the Tuol Sleng torture center in Phnom Penh, will probably go on trial in March. But he said four other defendants, all in their 80s, are unlikely to take the stand until 2010.
The trial process, which has so far cost $50 million, has been marred by delays, controversial defense motions, accusations of corruption and, most recently, a public dispute between Petit and his Cambodian co-prosecutor, Chea Leang, over future prosecutions.
Petit wants to file charges against an additional five or six former Khmer Rouge members, but Chea Leang has objected, saying that the court should concentrate its limited resources on the cases on hand. She has also cited a need to focus on national reconciliation.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
i wouldn't call "$50 million so far" limited resources. I t didn't take them that long too get Milosevich or saddam so why so long with these guys?
#8
Speaking of John Belushi, my friend flew some great flight scenes in his P-40 for the Belushi movie 1941. He said he had a ball, got his SAG card and still gets royalties. If you stop at 1:08 you can see a small man in Levis backing down the wing, that's Tommy.
Just before that scene you can see him almost stall when landing on the small road. The ground controller f-ed up his approach because of the power lines. That plane was a ball, he sold it to Flying Tiger Airlines in the 80s.
He also did some flight scenes, in a different P-40, for the latest Pearl Harbor movie.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
01/08/2009 14:37
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#11
My fav was definitely the one in the slip for BUtterfield 8. I would call that the peak of her career, in 1960. Next was Cleopatra in 1963 and it kept going downhill from there. Just like the rest of Hollywood.
Aswat al-Iraq: A cache containing arms and ammunition was found near Talaafar district, a local security source said on Wednesday.
"This afternoon, police personnel discovered a cache in al-Fadiliya village (25 km west of Talaafar)," the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency. The cache contained Kalashnikov rifles, 150 improvised explosive devices (IEDs), a large amount of TNT explosive, and 75 mortar shells, according to the source. The cache was found in light of intelligence tips from detainees, the source added.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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Aswat al-Iraq: Shiite Cleric Moqtada al-Sadr on Wednesday called to raise Palestinian flags over buildings, mosques and churches in expression of solidarity with the people in the Gaza Strip. Sadr has urged countries to "immediately shut down their Israeli embassies and to strip these terrorist spots of immunity," according to a statement released by Sadr's office in Najaf and received by Aswat al-Iraq news agency. The Shiite cleric also called to carry out reprisal attacks against "the Zionist enemy."
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
What part of FOAD Mukty does nop understand? Nuther cockroach. I wanted to call Korben Dallas and then realized he's in the future.
#2
I really think Mossad should have taken out Sadr, the leader of Hamas hiding in Syria as well as the leader of Hezzbolah at the kickoff to the invasion of Gaza.
Remove the Iranian puppets and see how quickly the Iranians can respond through their proxies.
I'd also have hammered out some kind of propoganda really connecting the Hamas with Shi'a. Down deep the Sunni hate the Shi'a and Arabs hate Persians and Israel needs to work that divide. Don't promote Jews in the propoganda, just emphasize that the Iranians are calling the shots and using Palestinians as pawns.
#4
My only guess is they cant' be found and/or Israel is afraid that the world would condem them (even more) if they expanded the war into other nations.
JERUSALEM - The European Union said on Wednesday it was prepared to help Egypt prevent arms smuggling along its border with the Gaza Strip as part of a ceasefire with Israel but played down the need for foreign ground forces.
Western and Israeli diplomats said the talks centred on the idea of sending specialised international forces or teams, equipped to search out and destroy smuggling tunnels, to the so-called Philadelphi corridor that runs between Gaza and Egypt.
European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana told Reuters in an interview in Israel that the bloc would consider ways to help the Egyptians combat arms smuggling. But Solana said hunting for tunnels under the Philadelphi corridor would 'be done probably with technology, not with people'. He said the technological means were available to address the problem, though he offered no specific details.
Israeli officials say advanced sonar can detect some tunnels but they are sceptical that technology alone would prevent Palestinians from rebuilding smuggling tunnels under the sandy, 14-km (9 mile)-long Philadelphi corridor.
A canal from the Med right along the corridor, 14 km long, 100 m wide and 30 m deep, would put a big dent in the problem ...
Israel's assault on the Gaza Strip has included several air force sorties in which 'bunker buster' bombs were dropped on the corridor, exploding underground and sending out shockwaves designed to collapse the secret passages.
Another senior EU diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the bloc was pushing for a broader monitoring mission as part of any Gaza ceasefire that would ensure both sides meet their obligations. This would include having monitors verify that Israel opens border crossings with the Gaza Strip to humanitarian and other goods. Israel has been cool to this idea.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/08/2009
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#1
Another senior EU diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Juden arouse
Media analyst Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post reported on Jan. 6 that President-elect Barack Obama has asked CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta to be the next surgeon general.
According to Kurtz's column, Gupta, a neurosurgeon who has worked as a CNN and CBS medical correspondent, "told administration officials that he wants the job."
A look into the Business & Media Institute archives revealed that Gupta thinks iPods are potentially dangerous to "breathe," tax increases are okay for the sake of the war on obesity, and the federal food grant program WIC isn't large enough.
Gupta supported the plan of San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom to impose a tax on drinks sweetened with "cheap" corn syrup in order to fight the "obesity epidemic." Dec. 18, 2007 "American Morning." At that time the price of corn was actually at an 11-year high.
On Nov. 9, 2007, CNN paged Dr. Gupta about "IPOD & IPHONE DANGER." Gupta reported that the cord connecting the earbuds to an iPod or iPhone contain phthalates and "may hinder the sexual development of mammals." CNN "American Morning" co-host John Roberts pointed out that the rodents in the study were fed the plastics and summarized the takeaway for viewers: "Don't Eat Your iPhone or your earbuds." "Or breathe it in," Gupta replied.
Gupta complained in April 2007 that the federal grant program Women, Infants and Children (WIC) was being "slashed" by the Bush administration. According to Gupta the proposed budget of $5.4 billion in 2008 for the food grant program wasn't large enough. The 2007 budget was $5.2 billion.
Gupta ate up a South L.A. councilwoman's plan to force her constituents to eat better by banning new fast-food restaurants. "[A]lthough obesity may not be eliminated entirely, studies show zoning laws are a good first step to fighting the problem," Gupta said on "American Morning" Nov. 16, 2007.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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Sigh... make up your mind, Sanjay. Either there's an obesity epidemic or WIC is underfunded. You can't have it both fucking ways, you pinhead.
Given what I see in my fairly crummy neighborhood, I'd go with "obesity epidemic". Maybe you might want to limit food stamp usage to fruits & veggies?
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
01/08/2009 11:34
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#2
fruits and veggies. That's what elephants and hippos eat. I suggest that the food stamps work in stores not in thier zip code. Force folks of their A$$.
5.4 is larger than 5.2 how is that a 'slash'? Is 150 lbs larger than 200 lB's? Look I just slashed 50 LBs.
Chris Matthews, the host of the MSNBC program "Hardball," told his staff on Wednesday night that he would not run for the Senate in 2010 from Pennsylvania.
For much of the last year, Mr. Matthews had been considering entering the Senate race as a Democrat in his home state at the same time he was renegotiating his contract with NBC News. He had attended several meetings that had included Pennsylvania representatives as well as some major fund-raisers in the Democratic Party. But Mr. Matthews, who was once a top aide to the House speaker, Tip O'Neill of Massachusetts, and ran for Congress as a Democrat in 1974, never formally declared himself a candidate, a decision which would have forced him out of his position at MSNBC.
In an interview in October, Mr. Matthews said, "People have asked me about it. I've never told anyone that I'm running."
There has been speculation that Mr. Matthews, 63, was flirting with a Senate run as a way to give him some leverage in his contract talks. According to at least one earlier report, NBC was planning to ask Mr. Matthews to return but wanted him to take a drastic pay cut -- from $5 million a year to an amount closer to $1 million. Since that report, "Hardball" has bounced back in the ratings, especially during the presidential election season, and NBC News executives have expressed much more interest in retaining Mr. Matthews
Mr. Matthews declined to comment last night, as did executives form NBC News. But one executive said that discussions with Mr. Matthews for a new contract to remain on "Hardball" were continuing.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/08/2009
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#1
I thought Mr.Tingles was only in his 40s or 50s. Must be a good makeup person over at LSDNBC.
OPEC's top producer says oil-producing states in the Middle East will not respond to Iran's call to halt crude supplies to Israeli supporters.
"The oil producers who need their income ... are not going to do that," Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal said at a Wednesday news conference. "The use of oil, especially at this time, is an idea that is at least past its worth," he said. "The important thing, oil is not a weapon. You can't reverse a conflict by using oil."
A senior Iranian commander had earlier in the week urged Muslim countries to cut oil exports to countries supporting Israel and the atrocities it comits in Gaza. "Oil is among major stimuli that can put pressure on Zionist regime's (Israel) supporters in the US and Europe," Brigadier General Mir-Faisal Baqerzadeh, Head of the Foundation for the Remembrance of the Holy Defense, said earlier on Sunday.
The Saudi prince said the idea of cutting oil production would only put pressure on oil-producing states causing them to "suffer as much as anybody else suffers."
The Saudi prince's remarks come amid dramatic slides in crude prices. Oil prices have lost more than $100 since hitting a record high of above $147 a barrel in July. The global financial turmoil, brought on by the US subprime-mortgage crisis has sharply slashed the demand for oil.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
headline should be corrected. While I VERY much appreciate KSA's role, including their refusal to embargo Israels SUPPORTERS, they are not currently shipping any oil to Israel itself, AFAIK.
Tehran has launched a campaign to promote an economic reform plan after parts of the proposal faced public disapproval in October.
In July 2008, the Iranian government announced that a value-added tax (VAT) mechanism would be introduced in the country by autumn, under which businesses would have to pay 3 percent of their sales receipts as tax. As the date for the implementation of the plan approached, merchants from Tehran's Bazaar -- the commercial heart of the country -- went on strike in protest at the VAT plan.
Following 10 days of widespread demonstrations across Iran, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced that he would introduce a bill to delay the implementation of the tax mechanism by at least one year. According to Tabnak, economic experts in the country have launched a campaign directed at ending the controversy surrounding the reform proposal; the plan is currently being discussed in various economic circles.
Critics of the plan demand that the Iranian government permanently revoke the program, arguing that the mechanism would contribute to creeping inflation.
Proponents of the plan, however, insist that VAT will help the country shift its dependency from oil revenues to indirect taxation.
The committee responsible for promoting the reform plan is actively organizing meetings and briefings across the country to prepare Iranian commercial circles for the long-anticipated economic changes.
President Ahmadinejad has long promised a populist economic platform that would challenge cronyism and corruption. After 4 years of Ahmadinejad administration, however, the Iranian president has been the recipient of severe criticism. Sixty leading economists from major Iranian universities have recently criticized the president in an open letter, saying he has not taken corrective measures to deal with the economic decline in the country.
President Ahmadinejad responded to the criticism by saying that his economic reform package -- submitted to parliament -- will eventually be able to resolve the economic problems gripping the country.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
the irainian non economy at its best. central planners challenging cronyism and corruption? Unlikely, in fact all good systems analysts know, that a systems top goal is self preservation. any tinkering at the edges is just sleight of hand. all systems are only as good as thier own sensory organs, what expectation can be extrapolated from this announcement? Clearly only one, the economics of this cabal are non economics, and thus incapable of reforming themselves. Iran and its identity crisis, not unlike russia and its identity crisis. both non economies in service to themselves as elitist identities, with overtly high coeficients of fiction.
The Taliban in Hangu killed three policemen and abducted three others when they stormed a police checkpost early on Wednesday.
Officials said the Taliban attacked the police post in Dalan area of Tal tehsil using heavy weapons. Three police personnel - Taimoor, Fazal Rahim and Daulat Shah - were killed, while Mohibullah, Tariq and Akhlaq were abducted by the Taliban. The Taliban also set the checkpost on fire.
Orakzai: Helicopter gunships targeting Taliban hideouts accidentally hit two civilian houses in Orakzai Agency. The houses were partially damaged, but no loss of life was reported, officials and locals told Daily Times on Wednesday. They said the gunships pounded Taliban hideouts in Kalaya village of Lower Orakzai Agency, but no Taliban casualties were reported.
Curfew: The Pakistan Army took over security operations in Hangu and imposed curfew in the city on the ninth day of Muharram. Troops were deployed on the rooftops of all high-rise buildings in the city and in the nearby hills for monitoring security. Locals said they were asked to stay indoors until the curfew was relaxed.
Meanwhile, unidentified armed men abducted two men at gunpoint from Naryab area of Hangu on Wednesday, locals said. One of the abducted men was identified as Malak Muhammad Amin, locals said. A local leader of the Awami National Party (ANP) - Malak Riaz Bangash- kidnapped 10 days ago, returned to his house along with his driver, family sources said.
Bajaur: Three Taliban were killed and six others injured as jet fighters targeted their hideouts in various areas of Bajaur Agency on Wednesday, official sources said. They said six trenches and some underground bunkers built by the Taliban had also been destroyed in the assault. Fighter jets targeted Taliban hideouts in Dama Dola and Khaza Pahar areas in Mamoond, Salarzai and Chargo Kandaw tehsils of Bajaur. Political administration claimed that most of Bajaur was now under the government's control.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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Aswat al-Iraq: Nearly two and a half million pilgrims, including a half million women, have ended the rituals of the Ashuraa visit, an official source from Karbala province said on Wednesday.
"Pilgrims have finished Twereej running, thus ending the Ashuraa visit," the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency. The Twereej running is a popular custom in the Ashuraa visit.
Shiites commemorate the killing of Imam Hussein Ibn Ali, his brother and friends in Karbala in the battle of Taf on Muharram 10, 61 (October 10, 680 AD on the Gregorian calendar).
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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#1
I'd make it "barbaric and unsanitary blood ritual", but whatever.
The Sri Lankan government officially outlawed the Tamil Tiger rebel group on Wednesday, a formality that ruled out the possibility of restarting peace talks any time soon to end a brutal quarter-century of civil war. The Cabinet unanimously agreed to ban the group after the guerrillas ignored an ultimatum to allow hundreds of thousands of civilians living in rebel-held areas to leave, Cabinet Minister Maithripala Sirisena said. The government, as well as international rights groups, have accused the Tamil Tigers of holding civilians as human shields to protect them against the military offensive into rebel-held territory.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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A senior Iranian politician met Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal in Damascus on Wednesday as the Palestinian Islamist group considered an Egyptian proposal for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. Ali Larijani, speaker of parliament and one of the major figures in the Islamic Republic, met Mashaal and several high level officials from Hamas at the Iranian embassy in the Syrian capital, witnesses said.
The meeting stretched into the early hours of Thursday, with no details emerging from the deliberations. Larijani earlier met leaders of Islamic Jihad, a smaller Palestinian group with close links to Iran.
Just making sure everyone knows the game plan ...
Iran and Syria are the major backers of Hamas, and Syria hosts members of Hamas' exiled leadership, including Mashaal. The two countries have influence on Hamas but little is known about what advice Tehran and Damascus have been giving Hamas in the current crisis.
Larijani also met President Bashar al-Assad on Wednesday to discuss the "dangerous situation" in Gaza, the official Syrian news agency said. He is the second Iranian official to visit Syria since Israel's ground invasion of Gaza began on Saturday.
Saeed Jalili, a senior Iranian security official, met Hamas and Islamic Jihad officials in Damascus this week, before Egypt announced a plan for a truce in Gaza brokered by France.
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/08/2009
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There will never be peace in the Middle East until Iran is dealt with!!!!
Another day, another bad poll for Caroline. Rep. Peter King, the Long Island Republican who is seriously considering a run at Hillary Clinton's seat, would give Caroline Kennedy serious trouble in a hypothetical 2010 match-up, according to a new poll. Kennedy, the political neophyte who's the frontrunner to replace Clinton, would barely eke out a Democratic win against King in a hypothetical contest, while New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo would trounce the combative King, the poll found.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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But it's always tough to beat an incumbent, especially one with her connections. She'd have to be awfully slow with the pork not to have her position well solidified after two years. That's the problem. Once she gets in there, she'll be there for life.
Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah on Wednesday warned that "all possibilities" were open against Israel as he gave a fiery speech on the Jewish state's offensive in Gaza.
"We have to act as though all possibilities are real and open with Israel and we must always be ready for any eventuality," said Nasrallah, whose Shiite forces fought a devastating war with Israel in 2006.
He warned that that the 2006 war, which killed some 1,200 mostly civilian Lebanese, would be "but a walk in the park" compared to what awaits Israel if it launches a new offensive on Lebanon.
He also rebuked Arab leaders for mediating a truce with Israel instead of siding with embattled Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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The contention in Iranian political circles that the country is immune to the global financial meltdown has been brought under question. The common perception in Iranian political circles is that the country has largely remained unaffected by the recent economic crisis gripping world countries.
The chairman of Iran's Expediency Council, Ayatollah Ali-Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani, questioned the validity of Iranian immunity on the issue on Thursday, saying that the country will face extreme difficulties due to its reliance on oil exports. "The government has real problems in determining its budget for next year and will have difficulty preparing a budget able to receive a Majlis vote," Hashemi-Rafsanjani said.
The senior Iranian official called on the government to take serious measures to ensure that the global economic crisis does not severely influence the country. His remarks are considered tacit criticism as they come days after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that Tehran has enough foreign exchange reserves to last for "three years" and can thus manage its affairs even if oil prices hit zero.
The Iranian government is extremely reliant on oil revenues and is vulnerable to price fluctuations. As a result of the sharp downward spiral in oil prices, some economists have predicted that Tehran will face a considerable budget deficit within months.
In September, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) predicted that Iran would face a fiscal deficit if crude oil prices fall below $90 a barrel. The Central Bank of Iran (CBI) has also warned that the economy will face major problems should oil prices fall below $60 a barrel.
President Ahmadinejad has refuted the claims, saying that falling oil prices will have no serious impact on the country's economy even if they reach "5 dollars" a barrel. "Some arrogant countries say Iran will be hit by falling oil prices, but we tell them that the financial crisis in the West did not affect us, so the fluctuations in the oil market will not gravely affect us either," he told reporters on the sidelines of an international press exhibition in Tehran last month.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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man... i feel so terribly heartbroken over this troubling news...
NOT
Posted by: Abu do you love ||
01/08/2009 0:35
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Iran hasn't finished paying for the rebuilding of the Hezballoh infrastructure yet (Rockets were paid for but not many offices or residences for Hezb big shots).
I'm also willing to bet a lot of the Mullahs had much of their embezzled wealth in hedge funds, fannie mae, WAMU, Etc.
The Khyber Agency political administration arrested a former Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) Landikotal chief here on Wednesday, as a military operation continued in the region to clear the supply route for NATO forces in Afghanistan. The once and future amir...
The arrested former JUI-F official Gul Rehman told Daily Times from the lockups in Landikotal that he had come to meet the tribesmen who were detained during the military operation when he was arrested, "without any charge or warrants". The JUI-F had recently expelled Rehman from the party.
Arrests: The political administration has also issued warrants for the arrest of JUI-F Khyber Agency chief Mufti Ijaz Shinwari, and for some tribesmen and Taliban leaders and asked them to surrender before the administration.
So far around two dozen tribal elders have been apprehended in the operation. They include a six-member jirga that had given a surety bond worth Rs 7 million, saying that two local Taliban leaders -- Hazrat Nabi and Hazrat Ali -- would appear before the administration whenever summoned and would not indulge in any criminal activity. The six jirga members were arrested two days ago when the two Taliban refused to obey summons to appear before the authorities. Detained tribesmen told journalists they had been imprisoned without being charged with any wrongdoing. They said they had not done anything illegal and had been arrested for protesting against load shedding and excesses by the political administration.
Landikotal Assistant Political Agent Azam Khan had recently told Daily Times that the Khyber political agent was fully aware of the military operation and that anyone could be detained or released on his orders.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/08/2009
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Thailand's new premier must ensure that troops who tortured and killed a Muslim cleric in the far south face justice, a rights group said on Thursday, adding that such abuses fuelled unrest in the region. Imam Yapa Koseng, a 56-year-old religious leader, was arrested in March last year and died days later in military custody in the Muslim-majority deep south, where a deadly separatist insurgency is raging. 
The Taliban in Mirali tehsil of North Waziristan Agency on Wednesday killed two Afghan nationals after accusing them of spying for the United States. Locals found the body of Habibullah at Khadi, 15 kilometres west of Mirali near Mirali-Miranshah Road. The body of the second Afghan, identified as Khan Muhammad Babar, was found in Shera Talla area, 20 kilometres from Mirali on Mirali-Tall Road. Notes found near the bodies said the people spying for the US would be dealt with in the same manner. Meanwhile, police in Swat district found an unidentified body in Kabal tehsil early on Wednesday. The incident follows the recovery of six bodies in the district on Tuesday, three of the deceased were reportedly soldiers.
The ongoing dispute over transit fees and pricing has halted Russian natural gas exports to Europe. Ukraine and Russia blame each other for the disruption that has curtailed vital gas deliveries to several European countries, including Hungary, Romania, Austria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. Amid freezing temperatures and usage restrictions, the Japanese automaker Suzuki says it is halting production at its Hungarian affiliate. 
A website has defended a message urging British Muslims to contact prominent British Jews to protest at the Israeli attacks on Gaza. The post was made during a discussion on Ummah, an Islamic internet forum. A member suggested that people who featured a list of influential Jews - including David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary - should be reminded of the plight of the Palestinian people.
Oil futures tumbled 12 percent, the most in more than seven years, after a U.S. government report showed bigger-than-expected increases in supplies of crude oil, gasoline and distillate fuel as consumption dropped. 
A wooden boat with nearly 200 people on board was found drifting off the northern tip of Indonesias Sumatra island Wednesday, officials said. The boat, with 19 people from Bangladesh and 174 from Myanmar on board, was found at sea by fishermen off Sabang island in Aceh province, local navy commander Yanuar Handwiyono said.
Three decades to the day after the fall of Cambodia's Khmer Rouge regime, the country finally received word of a possible starting date for the trial of one of its key leaders. 
A senior Iranian politician met Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal in Damascus on Wednesday as the Palestinian Islamist group considered an Egyptian proposal for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. Ali Larijani, speaker of parliament and one of the major figures in the Islamic Republic, met Mashaal and several high level officials from Hamas at the Iranian embassy in the Syrian capital, witnesses said.
The Khyber Agency political administration arrested a former Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) Landikotal chief here on Wednesday, as a military operation continued in the region to clear the supply route for NATO forces in Afghanistan. 
