Poland and the Czech Republic enraged Russia by backing a U.S. plan to put missile bases in their countries.
Now, as the Obama administration signals a willingness to reverse course ahead of a NATO defense ministers meeting starting Thursday, those two countries are fearful of being left out on a limb with their giant neighbor nursing a grudge.
If Washington scraps the project, the decision will be seen by Eastern Europe long under the Soviet yoke as a major concession to Moscow and, quite possibly, a tacit acceptance of the view that Russia should have more say in its traditional sphere of influence.
"A lot of people put a stake in this project and they will feel disappointed even betrayed" if it fails, said Andrzej Jodkowski, director of the Polish branch of the Missile Defense Advocacy Alliance, a U.S.-based group that favors the shield.
While missile defense is not on the agenda of the NATO meeting, it's certain to come up.
Polish Defense Minister Bogdan Klich said Wednesday ahead of the alliance's gathering in Krakow that he was waiting "with great interest" on what U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates would have to say on the project.
"We Poles are most interested in whether the commitments the U.S. signed with us last year the deal about a missile defense installation in Poland will be kept," Klich said. "I hope that will happen ... and that the installation will be placed in Poland." Too bad for the E. Euros a Marxist and an imperialist are leading the USA and Russia.
Rest at link
Posted by: ed ||
02/18/2009
18:22 ||
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Now, as the Obama administration signals a willingness to reverse course ahead of a NATO defense ministers meeting starting Thursday, those two countries are fearful of being left out on a limb with their giant neighbor nursing a grudge.
That's what happens when you spend too much time negotiating for that final concession instead of taking a good enough deal and acting quickly on it. Oh well, perhaps the next U.S. president will readdress this January 22nd or so, 2013.
#2
"A lot of people put a stake in this project and they will feel disappointed -- even betrayed" if it fails, said Andrzej Jodkowski, director of the Polish branch of the Missile Defense Advocacy Alliance, a U.S.-based group that favors the shield.
The Poles? Betrayed? After they hemmed and hawed for years over how many additional billions we would have to give them in compensation?
The US government may have to nationalise some banks on a temporary basis to fix the financial system and restore the flow of credit, Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve chairman, has told the Financial Times.
In an interview, Mr Greenspan, who for decades was regarded as the high priest of laisser-faire capitalism, said nationalisation could be the least bad option left for policymakers.
It may be necessary to temporarily nationalise some banks in order to facilitate a swift and orderly restructuring, he said. I understand that once in a hundred years this is what you do.
Mr Greenspans comments capped a frenetic day in which policymakers across the political spectrum appeared to be moving towards accepting some form of bank nationalisation.
We should be focusing on what works, Lindsey Graham, a Republican senator from South Carolina, told the FT. We cannot keep pouring good money after bad. He added, If nationalisation is what works, then we should do it.
Speaking to the FT ahead of a speech to the Economic Club of New York on Tuesday, Mr Greenspan said that in some cases, the least bad solution is for the government to take temporary control of troubled banks either through the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation or some other mechanism.
The former Fed chairman said temporary government ownership would allow the government to transfer toxic assets to a bad bank without the problem of how to price them.
But he cautioned that holders of senior debt bonds that would be paid off before other claims might have to be protected even in the event of nationalisation.
You would have to be very careful about imposing any loss on senior creditors of any bank taken under government control because it could impact the senior debt of all other banks, he said. This is a credit crisis and it is essential to preserve an anchor for the financing of the system. That anchor is the senior debt.
Mr Greenspans comments came as President Barack Obama signed into law the $787bn fiscal stimulus in Denver, Colorado. Mr Obama will announce on Wednesday a $50bn programme for home foreclosure relief in Phoenix, Arizona. Meanwhile, the White House was working last night on the latest phase of the bailout for two of the big three US carmakers.
In his speech after signing the stimulus, which he called the most sweeping recovery package in our history, Mr Obama set out a vertiginous timetable of federal decisions in the coming weeks that included fixing the US banking system, submission next week of the 2009 budget and a bipartisan White House meeting to address longer-term fiscal discipline.
We need to end a culture where we ignore problems until they become full-blown crises, said Mr Obama. Today does not mark the end of our economic troubles but it does mark the beginning of the end.
#1
Thanks Captain Ed Smith for your opinion. You know, there are plenty of banks out there which are doing just fine despite the fact they don't buy giant logos on sports arenas or sport vikings buying lingerie. High priest indeed - IMHO greenspan more than anyone should have been waving warning flags.
#2
Yeah right. Temporary like the Dukakis sales tax increases in MA. Temporary, for 25 years, and then it took a public referendum to trim, not end, them.
#3
"It may be necessary to temporarily nationalise some banks in order to facilitate a swift and orderly restructuring," he said. "I understand that once in a hundred years this is what you do."
What a maroon.
I'm surprised he didn't do more damage given how long he was in the job.
#4
May I point out that Alexander Hamilton, first Secretary of the Treasury, had the Bank of the United States chartered as a federal institution. Hardly a socialist or Marxist. If it's a choice between nationalizing a bank or just sucking up its bad paper and debts, I'd rather we get the whole package. Why should other financial entities get to pick up the good stuff at close out prices and the American taxpayer gets stuck with the remaining bag of crap? As new owners of the assimilated financial institutions, we have standing to go back and collect from officers who operated the entity in abject failure of their fiduciary responsibilities.
#5
"go back and collect from officers who operated the entity in abject failure of their fiduciary responsibilities"
Sounds nice, p2k - but do you honestly believe the DemoncRats will do that to their campaign supporters?
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
02/18/2009 18:57
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Hamilton also thought term limits were a bad idea. And he would never have supported putting the backbone of the American economy in the hands of government.
Posted by: Mike N. ||
02/18/2009 19:04
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The way the system should work is the shareholders carry the can up to the full amount of their investment, ie until their shares are worth zero. Nationalization just sounds like a way to sell the banks as a 'going concern'.
Socialising bank losses by buying up bad paper is crazy.
#8
but do you honestly believe the DemoncRats will do that to their campaign supporters?
Statute of limitations is longer than 8 years unless you believe the Donks are not going to ever give up power, then we have far greater problems than just collecting.
WASHINGTON -- For the first time, some airline passengers will skip metal detectors and instead be screened by body scanning machines that look through clothing for hidden weapons, the Transportation Security Administration said Tuesday.
An experimental program that begins today at Tulsa International Airport will test whether the $170,000 body scanners could replace $10,000 metal detectors that have screened airline passengers since 1973. Airports in San Francisco, Las Vegas, Miami, Albuquerque and Salt Lake City will join the test in the next two months, TSA spokesman Christopher White said.
The scanners aim to close a loophole by finding non-metallic weapons such as plastic and liquid explosives, which the TSA considers a major threat. The machines raise privacy concerns because their images reveal outlines of private body parts.
"We're getting closer and closer to a required strip-search to board an airplane," said Barry Steinhardt of the American Civil Liberties Union.
Privacy advocate Melissa Ngo fears that passengers won't understand that the scanners take vivid images that screeners take vivid images that screeners view.
White said each scanner has explanatory signs on how the machines work and posters showing the image they create.
Passengers at the test airports will be instructed to go through the new scanners. Anyone who doesn't want to go through will be allowed to refuse and instead go through a metal detector and receive a pat-down, White said.
People in the scanner will stand with their arms raised and their face will be blurred out in the metallic-looking image on a nearby screen. TSA screeners view the images from inside a closed room near a checkpoint and immediately delete them.
"We've struck a very good balance between security and privacy," White said.
Christopher Bidwell, security chief at the Airports Council International trade group, said the scanner "really does not reveal as much as some people might think." But will it reveal a CT and/or VPL.
The scanners aim to address problems exposed by government probes in which covert agents got liquid explosives and detonators through airport checkpoints. A 2005 Homeland Security report urged better checkpoint technology.
Security analyst Bruce Schneier, a frequent critic of the TSA, said the scanners should improve security but warned that they take longer than metal detectors -- 30 seconds vs. about 15 seconds per passenger. "There will be pressure to do the screening faster, which will be sloppier," Schneier said.
The scanners bounce harmless "millimeter waves" off passengers' bodies and use no radiation.
The TSA has done preliminary tests of the scanner on passengers who had just passed through metal detectors. Those tests found that the machines excel at finding hidden objects, White said.
Based on the results of the latest test, the TSA will decide at an undetermined date whether to use more body scanners in place of metal detectors.
#2
All right, folks, remove all clothing and jewelry and other attachments. Place them in the bins over there. When completed, please line up for the showers, er, I mean plane.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
02/18/2009 16:41
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DarthVader
Unless you know how to moon in Tagalog the SFO TSA workers won't understand what you're doing.
#6
There's a neat /similar scene in the fifth element, where Bruce Willits boards a Pan Am Space shuttle, is slid into a bunk like space, the stewardess his a switch and he's knocked out for the flight
Posted by: Rednek Jim ||
02/18/2009 19:34
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#7
Hell, why don't they all just force everyone to fly naked?
#3
I thought the cartoon was funny. Trying to paint this as racism is ridiculous. There WAS a rampaging chimp, shot dead by police, in the news yesterday (in case you didn't know)....
Posted by: ed ||
02/18/2009 17:08
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Most of the land occupied by the country of Israel was purchased from Turkish Overlords. The Paleos have been sharecroppers there for centuries, never owning the land, but paying their Turkish Overlords the annual rent.
Texas financier R. Allen Stanford is accused of cheating 50,000 customers out of $8 billion dollars but despite raids Tuesday of his financial empire in Houston, Memphis, and Tupelo, Miss., federal authorities say they do not know the current whereabouts of the CEO.
No kidding. $8 billion and change and he disappeared? I'm shocked, shocked ...
The Securities Exchange Commission alleges Stanford ran a fraud promising investors impossible returns, much like Bernard Madoff's $50 billion alleged Ponzi scheme.
Investigators Tuesday shut down and froze the assets of three of the companies Stanford controls and they say the case could grow to be as big as the Madoff scandal. Like Madoff's clients, Stanford's investors are in shock. But in addition to angry clients, Stanford, like Madoff, has many friends in Washington.
Stanford's business is headquartered on the Caribbean island of Antigua. In the last decade, Stanford and his companies have spent more than $7 million on lobbyists and campaign contributions in efforts to loosen regulation of offshore banks.
Among the top recipients: Senator Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), Congressman Pete Sessions (R-Texas), Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), Senator Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) and Senator John Cornyn (R-Texas), one of the members who took a trip to Antigua where he was entertained by Stanford. Sen Cornyn's office has said the trip "was strictly a fact-finding trip," and at the time, "there was nothing untoward or unseemly" about Stanford Financial.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009
14:22 ||
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Is there any financial genius out there that isn't running a Ponzi scheme?
The president of my senior class in high school was a "financier". Harvard boy. He's now doing about 18 years at one of the Club feds.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
02/18/2009 16:04
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#3
Should have picked a headquarters w/o extradition to the US.
Posted by: ed ||
02/18/2009 16:43
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He has six planes, all registered in the US. He also has offices in Mexico, Panama, Ecuador, Peru, Colombia, and Venezuela, besides Antigua. I imagine he also has a nice yacht so he could be most anywhere.
#5
If what I heard on the news is true about him owing nearly 100 mill in back taxes, don't worry. They'll find him. Someone will turn him in for the "reward" that the IRS is gonna offer.
Russian authorities have put on hold a secret contract with Iran. The contract, which is believed to have been signed in 2005, planned to arm the Islamic Republic with the famous S-300 air-defence missile systems. The latest move comes ahead of talks between the Russian and American presidents set for April 2009.
Irans defence minister Mostafa Mohammad Hajjar, a veteran of the Revolutionary Guards of Iran, arrived in Moscow on Monday for talks on the supply of Russian arms to Iran, particularly the S-300 systems.
However, as reported in Kommersant Daily, Moscow will not deliver the missile systems for some time, at least not before the first meeting of Russian president Dmitry Medvedev and American counterpart Barack Obama, a historic event widely expected to melt the ice in Russia-US relations and restart a dialogue between the two sides.
They'll deliver the following week just to let Bambi know how far his influence extends.
Iran does not follow resolutions of the UN Security Council concerning its nuclear programme and that fact alone is enough to put Russia in an awkward position if it delivers S-300s to Iran now. So far, Moscow and Tehran have fulfilled only one contract in air defence dating back to 2005 when Russia sold Iran 29 Thor-M1 middle-range missile air-defence systems for US$700 million.
Since then, Tehran has showed intense interest in S-300 systems and even signed a secret contract for delivery of 5 divisions of S-300s for US$800 million. But despite the fact that the contract has been initialised and Iran expresses its readiness to pay, Moscow has delayed the supply for political reasons as the question of arming Iran with the newest defence systems greatly alarms Americas principle Middle East ally, Israel.
Its not just once that the Iranian authorities have jumped the gun and declared that S-300s have already been delivered and deployed, claims always refuted by Russia. The last such instance was on December 22, 2008.
Iran desperately needs the S-300s to protect the almost completed Bushehr nuclear power plant, which is likely to be a high priority target in the event of military conflict with Israel. If S-300 systems are deployed near Bushehr, Israel will be unable to conduct air strikes without response as it did in 1981, when it destroyed a nuclear reactor in Iraq, as well as in 2007, when it took out a supposedly nuclear target in Syria.
At the same time Russian experts doubt whether Israel would dare to conduct an air strike against Iranian nuclear targets. Israel does not have a reason for such an assault since Iran does not have and, in the near future, will not have nuclear arms, and the US seems to be looking for a political resolution with Iran, Israel will not do the dirty on Obamas administration says political analyst Aleksandr Pikayev from the Institute of World Economy and International Relations.
Russia does not supply only military products to Iran. The construction of a nuclear power plant in Bushehr is just another example for this. For Russia, Iran is a friendly state. Russia is in constant dialogue with Iran, advising it to comply with its international obligations. Clever people in Washington understand that Russia has vast interests in Iran because it is an ally and strategic friend and neighbour, so it is natural that Russia extends some commercial projects in Iran commented military expert Viktor Mizin from the Moscow Institute of International Affairs.
It is true that five S-300 missile systems could secure the skies above Bushehr nuclear power plant, but it looks really doubtful that Moscow will put at risk the opportunity of improving the severely damaged relations with Washington.
That's a silly statement. We don't have a lot that Russia really wants once we cancel the missile defense system in Poland. The Russians just want us to stay out of the way and Bambi has already shown that's what he's going to do.
This means that this time the Iranian delegation may leave Moscow without any tangible results. However, the political situation is subject to change, which means that the fate of Iranian air defence literally depends on what Barack Obama has to propose to Dmitry Medvedev in April this year.
In turn, it is obvious that American leadership is planning to take a diplomatic pause till June when Iran will elect a new president and if it turns out to be someone less irreconcilable like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, then the US will deal directly with the Iranian authorities.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009
14:18 ||
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Moscow will be under Tehran's nuke missiles even before Berlin. And the majority atheist Russians aren't even people of the book. Hell, the number of muslims just about equals the number of Christians.
Posted by: ed ||
02/18/2009 16:34
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What's Iran going to use to pay for this fine Russian hardware? Oil futures?
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
02/18/2009 16:35
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Sure, why not, Rich? All the Iranians have to do is start an armed conflict in the Persian Gulf and the value of Russian oil futures goes way up. Like, way way past whatever the cost of the S-300's are.
EVERETT, Wash., Feb 16 (Reuters) - The chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives' appropriations subcommittee on defense renewed a call on Monday for the Pentagon to consider splitting a $35 billion aerial refueling tanker contract between Boeing Co and a rival team of EADS and Northrop Grumman Corp. The call, by Pennsylvania Democratic Rep. John Murtha, is a direct challenge to the Pentagon, which has been adamant that contracting only one supplier would be the cheapest for U.S. taxpayers.
It is the latest twist in an almost decade-long saga of deciding who should build tankers to refuel U.S. jet fighters and supply U.S. forces around the world.
"I'm trying to figure out a way to convince the secretary of defense to at least look at two airplanes, or both of them," said Murtha, after a tour of Boeing's widebody aircraft plant in Everett, north of Seattle. "My decision is not where the contract goes, but to come up with the money to pay for the contract once the Air Force makes a decision," said Murtha. "We are trying to come up with ways to get the military to make a decision earlier."
Attempts to start building replacements for the aging U.S. tanker fleet have been bogged down since 2001, when the Air Force hatched a plan to lease and then buy tankers from Boeing, which was subsequently derailed by a procurement scandal. The Northrop/EADS team won the contract last year, but the Government Accountability Office later found errors in the award after a protest by Boeing.
The Pentagon is now looking to start a new competition for the contract this year with an award in early 2010. So far, both Defense Secretary Robert Gates and undersecretary of defense for acquisition John Young have both come out publicly in favor of a single-source tanker.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009
14:16 ||
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How much for Murtha and how much for his district?
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
02/18/2009 16:51
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#2
If I was Murtha I would assume anyone near me is wearing a wire. And for good reason.
#3
Stupid coward. Increase the logistics burden by 2X to support 2 tankers when 1 will do. In addition, what will the US do when France decides it doesn't approve of our military actions and withholds parts, ala Belgium. At least France has the excuse it not a full member of NATO.
Posted by: ed ||
02/18/2009 16:54
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#4
...IIRC, Boeing still has a factory in Philly - the old Piasecki/Vertol plant. Remember - all politics is local.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
02/18/2009 18:34
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#5
Worse than that it gives Airbus/EADS a foothold in the dollar zone whereas we dont have one in the eurozone for manufacturing either civilian or military aircraft. This allows EADS to essentially offset forex price swings as they occur
LONDON (AP) -- Irish authorities said Tuesday they are monitoring a major oil spill that is drifting toward the Irish coast -- the largest spill in the waters around Ireland in a decade. The Irish Marine Department said the oil slick was discovered close to where a Russian aircraft carrier was refueling in the Celtic Sea between western Britain and the southern coast of Ireland.
The department said Tuesday it was too early to predict how much of the spill, thought to be around 500 tons (3,750 barrels), will come ashore. The oil slick is about three miles long and three miles wide.
Irish authorities learned about the spill Saturday through surveillance carried out by the European Maritime Safety Agency in Lisbon, Portugal. Irish military aircraft flew over the area and saw the Russian aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov, a Russian oil tanker, and a Russian oceangoing tug near the slick.
Russia's chief of general staff Gen. Nikolai Marakov confirmed that a Russian aircraft carrier had refueled in the area but denied there had been any problems. "We have no reason to think that anything went wrong during refueling," he told reporters.
"Wudn't us."
Ireland's Department of Transport said it expects the slick to reach the southern coast of Ireland in about 16 days. It said some of the oil will evaporate and most of the rest will likely develop into tar balls -- small, sticky patches of oil that often wash ashore.
The Press Association, the British news agency, said a Russian destroyer, a British destroyer, an Irish Naval vessel and a Russian aircraft carrier are at the site of the spill off the west coast of Ireland.
An Irish vessel set off Tuesday evening to assess whether the oil can be mechanically cleaned up at sea to limit the damage to coastline.
Earlier in the day, Russian Navy spokesman Capt. Igor Dygalo said there had been no problems with the Russian ships. "There have been no accidents on Russian ships linked to broken pipes or burst fuel tanks, nor has there been any deliberate dumping of fuel into the sea," he said in a statement carried by Russian news wires.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009
14:15 ||
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Why not burn it before it hits the beach? Oh boy, bring out the marshmellows.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
02/18/2009 16:48
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Irish military aircraft flew over the area and saw the Russian aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov, a Russian oil tanker, and a Russian oceangoing tug near the slick.
Nah, it couldn't have been them. I mean, they said so...
In three months since Election Day, at least a half-dozen prominent journalists have taken jobs working for the federal government.
Journalists, including some of those who've jumped ship, say it's better to have a solid job in government than a shaky job -- or none at all -- in an industry that's fading fast.
And it's a cush job. Nice pay-off ...
But conservative critics answer with a question: Would journalists be making the same career choices if John McCain had beaten Barack Obama in November?
The question answers itself ...
"Obama bails out more media water-carriers," conservative blogger Michelle Malkin wrote upon hearing that the Chicago Tribune's Jill Zuckman is taking a job with the Obama administration.
Blogs at both the Weekly Standard and the National Review are pointing to a "revolving door" that spins between the media and the Obama administration. And while Brent Bozell, president of the conservative Media Research Center, acknowledges that financial troubles may be forcing reporters out of newsrooms, he thinks it's worth noting where they're going. "When some leave journalism because of a reduction in staff, what's the natural landing spot?" The Obama administration," Bozell charged.
Zuckman says it's not so. In an interview, she said that she began looking around for a new job last month, motivated by the grim state of the industry -- her employer, the Tribune Co., recently slashed its D.C. bureau -- and also by her own feeling that she'd accomplished what she'd set out to do covering politics.
She said she had no plans to go to the administration -- until she heard about an opening under Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, a former Republican representative she's long respected for reaching across the aisle.
So, would Zuckman have taken -- or even been offered -- such a job if McCain were president? "I have a great deal of respect for [McCain] and have thoroughly enjoyed covering him over the years," Zuckman said. "But there's no way I can answer your hypothetical because I wouldn't know who he would have chosen for secretary of transportation. My decision to go to work for the Obama administration is tied up in my relationship with Ray LaHood and his focus on getting the economy back on track."
As for other reporters making similar moves, Zuckman said that she didn't think there would be so many "if the industry were stable."
But it isn't, and there are.
On Tuesday, Cox's Scott Shepard joined Sen. John Kerry's office as a speechwriter, becoming the second journalist this year to take a job under the Massachusetts Democrat. Investigative reporter Doug Frantz is now chief investigator under the Kerry-helmed Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
A week before Zuckman announced that she's headed for Obama's Transportation Department, her Tribune colleague Peter Gosselin signed on as speechwriter for Obama's treasury secretary, Tim Geithner.
In December, Jay Carney relinquished his perch as Time's Washington bureau chief to become Vice President Joe Biden's communications director. Warren Bass left the Washington Post's Outlook section to write speeches and advise Dr. Susan Rice at the United Nations. Daniel W. Reilly left Politico to become communications director for Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) Linda Douglass left the National Journal for the Obama campaign back in May and is expected to become assistant secretary for public affairs in the department of Health and Human Services.
On Monday, Pew's Project for Excellence in Journalism published a report on "The New Washington Press Corps," grim statistics confirming the high rate at which regional newspapers are shuttering their D.C. bureaus while niche and foreign outlets grow. Of the journalists flocking to government jobs, Pew Project Director Tom Rosenstiel says: "There's no mystery here, and I don't think the key to this is ideological as much as economic. The newspaper industry, in Washington in particular, is suffering mightily."
They could sell shoes ...
Rosenstiel noted that Shepard would have been out of a job by April, when Cox's D.C. bureau will close after over three decades -- and that Zuckman's bureau has been downsized following consolidation among the Tribune Co.'s papers.
In the case of Frantz, who was laid off from Portfolio magazine in November, Rosenstiel said his Senate job isn't much of a departure from the investigative reporting he'd done for decades -- both require "a prosecutorial mindset."
But the magazine didn't have the power to subpoena ...
Both require money, too, and government may be better suited than media companies to provide it for now.
"I didn't leave journalism easily and I'll always think of myself as a reporter, with a notepad tucked in his back pocket and a lot of unanswered questions," Frantz told Politico last month. But even if Frantz views himself as a reporter, he's no longer working for the Newhouse, Sulzberger or Chandler families. Instead, a Democratic politician signs the paychecks.
Frantz isn't alone in downplaying the partisan aspect of his new job. Maybe it's based on a lifetime of nonpartisan conditioning, but many of the reporters who've made the leap to government seem hesitant to admit that they're no longer impartial observers.
Oh sure, yewbetcha, it's a real struggle for them ...
"This is a Democratic administration; we're obviously on that side of the aisle, but I don't see this as a partisan job at all," Carney told the Times a couple weeks back.
Carney told the Times that he had "an affinity" with Biden and Obama, but that it didn't influence his coverage at the newsweekly. Time staffers have told Politico that they could never tell Carney's politics during the 2008 race. "I didn't even know Jay was a Democrat," Time's Joe Klein said.
But does that mean Carney would have been just as eager to take a job as press secretary for Vice President Sarah Palin?
Currently traveling with Biden, Carney declined to be interviewed.
For Bozell, the ease of the transition is telling. "If you are in journalism, and you can so easily fit in the world of politics, it tells you something," Bozell said, "that you were not that detached from it when you were in journalism."
Perhaps proving Bozell's point, journalists say that there used to be more stigma attached when a reporter crossed over to cover someone he's covered. Now, they say, it's hard to consider a colleague a sell-out when the alternative to a government job could be the unemployment line.
Al Hunt, the executive Washington editor for Bloomberg News, said that making the switch used to be a "very weighty" decision -- and that it's not anymore. "It's a sad commentary on the state of the business," Hunt said, adding that people have "got to put food on the table."
He acknowledged that journalists weren't exactly flocking to government work when George W. Bush took office in 2001, but he said that the industry factors were different then. No one was seriously predicting in February 2001 that large cities in the United States might be without daily newspapers by the time the year was out.
They're making those kinds of predictions now. And Hunt says those economic fears -- rather than an ideological bias -- are driving the decisions journalists are making. "If you can't find a job in journalism and you live in Washington, the only option is a government job, and the government is dominated by Democrats," he said. "That's less ideological than it is situational."
#4
and also by her own feeling that she'd accomplished what she'd set out to do covering politics
Yup, she helped get a Socialist Nobody elected President and helped get a Democrat majority in both houses.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
02/18/2009 18:23
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WASHINGTON (AP) - Attorney General Eric Holder described the United States Wednesday as a nation of cowards on matters of race, saying most Americans avoid discussing unresolved racial issues.
Usually because when we do there's someone in the crowd who starts screaming and calling people names. That does rather tend to inhibit deep conversation.
In a speech to Justice Department employees marking Black History Month, Holder said the workplace is largely integrated but Americans still self-segregate on the weekends and in their private lives. "Though this nation has proudly thought of itself as an ethnic melting pot, in things racial we have always been and continue to be, in too many ways, essentially a nation of cowards," said Holder, nation's first black attorney general.
Race issues continue to be a topic of political discussion, Holder said, but "we, as average Americans, simply do not talk enough with each other about race."
He doesn't want us to talk about race. He wants us to do as we're told. There's a difference ...
He urged people of all races to use Black History Month as a chance for frank talk about & blah blah blah.
#2
How rude to castigate Americans for being polite! I wonder how long he will remain in office... and how much he will actually accomplish before 2010.
#7
...A comment I'm sure he made in front of a crowd that almost certainly voted en bloc for our first African-American president.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
02/18/2009 18:37
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#8
"a nation of cowards."
Not sure how Holder can accept a paycheck from all of us.... "cowards." I guess he'd rather cash his hefty check, then bite our hands now and then. Yes, in my "private life" as well as my public life... I WANT ABSOLUTLY NOTHING TO DO WITH ATTORNEY GENERAL ERIC HOLDER!
#9
I'm offended that the NBA doesn't reflect America's rich heritage of short white guys. They are a significant proportion of the population, yet they aren't represented in proportional numbers. What say you, Eric Holder? A DOJ-led national suit? RICO? (is RICO a slur?)
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/18/2009 21:37
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#1
As a complete agnostic my opinions on abortion have nothing to do with religion. They are primarily based on my experience being present at the births of my sons.
The question I asked is: "What is the significant difference between this particular mass of human DNA at 16:40:00 today and the same mass of human DNA at 16:41:00?
As far as I can tell the answer is 0. So what makes killing that unique creature at 16:40 acceptable, but not at 16:41? How about 12:40? Or 08:40? What's the difference?
The only compromise that to me makes any sense at all is to use the inverse of the rules about "pulling the plug". If you have an adult in a coma that shows brain activity and whose heart is beating steadily would you be allowed to pull the plug and not feed that patient? Especially if the prognosis was for a complete, successful recovery?
If a fetus has brain activity and a heart beat shouldn't that be enough?
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton pledged a new American openness to ideas from abroad, especially the Muslim world, during a visit Wednesday to Indonesia.
Anti-US protests were held in several cities, with some Islamic hard-liners setting tires on fire and others throwing shoes at caricatures of Clinton, but the rallies were small and scattered.
Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, is the second stop in Clinton's inaugural overseas trip as the top US diplomat. She said that was "no accident," with the trip designed to show support for the country's hard-won democracy as well as its efforts to fight terrorism while respecting human rights.
Thank W for the hard-won democracy ...
Steps were already being taken to improve relations, she said, announcing at a joint press conference with Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda that Peace Corps operations were expected to resume here after a long absence.
#6
Who let her out without a male relative escort?
Posted by: ed ||
02/18/2009 16:22
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#7
The hypocrisy of her wearing a veil like she respects or understands the Muslim faith. The worlds Muslim leaders must be laughing until they cant breath. Otherwise they would be insulted by her condescending actions. Our leaders just dont get it and continue to play the fool on the world stage.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
02/18/2009 20:20
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#8
Muslims do not like non-Muslims (infidels), period, Ms. Clinton. Read the Koran...
Judea and Samaria Police have launched an investigation after receiving a complaint Wednesday by a Palestinian motorist who said his vehicle was stoned by a group of Israelis as he drove in the vicinity of the former settlement of Homesh, in the northern West Bank.
The driver was then dragged out of the car and the vehicle was set alight, police said.
The Palestinian man escaped without injuries. If true, a small step in the right direction---time for Arabs to learn that inolerance is a two way street.
President Shimon Peres said Wednesday that he had erred in supporting Israel's unilateral withdrawal from Gaza.
The revealing remarks come three years after Israel's evacuation of the volatile coastal strip which has since been seized by Hamas.
"Whatever will happen in the future, we shall not repeat the mistakes we made in leaving Gaza," Peres said in a question and answer session with a group of American Jewish leaders. "It should have been done otherwise. I was for leaving Gaza. I consider myself as one of the persons mistaken." Unfuckingbelievable It's like the One supporting personal fiscal responsibility
#1
If only he had made this realization BEFORE the withdrawal, and subsequently ruining countless lives on both sides of the Gaza border. Plenty of other people knew exactly what would happen. Most of the Rantburg-reading population, for example.
#2
Then why don't the slithering lump of slime not resign?
Ah!
turning with the wind, isn't he!
Posted by: Ming the Merciless ||
02/18/2009 20:18
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President Peres may be saying this now to keep a check-rein on Kadima, should they be the ones to form the new government. Tzipi has been talking about trading land for peace... although hopefully she just means trade land with Arabs on it for land with Israelis on it.
The Vatican Press Office released a note this morning detailing part of the conversation which Pope Benedict XVI had with Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House of Representatives. Vatican insiders relay that such releases are always phrased in diplomatic language and thus the correction of the Speaker who fancies herself a faithful Catholic despite her abortion advocacy can be taken as a rebuke.
The text of the note reads: "His Holiness took the opportunity to speak of the requirements of the natural moral law and the Church's consistent teaching on the dignity of human life from conception to natural death which enjoin all Catholics, and especially legislators, jurists and those responsible for the common good of society, to work in cooperation with all men and women of good will in creating a just system of laws capable of protecting human life at all stages of its development." Sad thing is, this is wasted on Pelosi, who has already sacrificed her core faith on the altar of Leftist Political Expediency. Its not that the Church is not teaching, it is that Pelosi refuses to heed the teaching. IMHO, she should stop calling herself Catholic, and should be refused communion due to being excommunicated latae sententiae (self-excommunicated by her own acts). If her Archbishop had the courage to act he could make it quite clear.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
02/18/2009 13:11
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He also underscored -- for Pelosi, Joe Biden, Ted Kennedy, John Kerry, Barbara Mikulski, Rose DeLauro, Kathleen Sebelius, and everyone else -- that the Church's opposition to the taking of innocent human life, at any stage of the human journey, is not some weird Catholic hocus-pocus; it's a first principle of justice than can be known by reason. It is a "requirement of the natural moral law" -- that is, the moral truths we can know by thinking about what is right and what is wrong -- to defend the inviolability of innocent human life. You don't have to believe in papal primacy to know that; you don't have do believe in seven sacraments, or the episcopal structure of the Church, or the divinity of Christ, to know that. You don't even have to believe in God to know that. You only have to be a morally serious human being, willing to work through a moral argument -- which, of course, means being the kind of person who understands that moral truth cannot be reduced to questions of feminist political correctness or partisan political advantage.
Moreover, it is reasonable to assume that Pope Benedict did not have only Pelosi in mind when he said what he had to say about the obligations of moral reason and the duties of statesmanship. President Obama is not a Catholic, but he should understand that he will get the same message if, as expected, he meets with His Holiness later this year.
#6
Is this the evil Pope who stands against abortion or the courageous Pope who stands against capital punishment? I can never keep my popes straight ...
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009 13:58
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#7
This is the Pope that helped Nazis escape to South America after Germany fell.
#8
I'm sorry, terrible post, please delete. I am just so unhappy that my county's future has been sold out that I am bitter towards everything.
The Pope is couragous and honorable.
#9
I'm no Catholic, but it's the Pope who stands for protecting innocent life which is a lot different from taking the life of those who deny life, liberty and property to others.
#10
Which Pope? one and the same. Life is the value, and it is consistent. Death Penalty opposition is due to possibility of error, and the retained opportunity for redemption, the basic respect for life evne that of a criminal.
However, the death penalty is allowed for by this Pope and by Catholic (and Christian) theology, much as is self defense, and "just war".
Note that those things are fundamentally unlike elective abortion, which is always an evil act. It is the deliberate destruction of a defenseless human life. Period. And no theology needed, there are some very good atheistic arguments to that effect, based on the sanctity of human life (if this life is all we have, then its all the more valuable, proceed from there).
#11
From any number of thological and non-theological bases, one can surmise that elective abortion is moral abomination for those who choose to do such evil. This means both the doctor and the woman. They are both culpable like a murderer and his accomplice - guilt flows to the one holding the victim down, and the one slicing the victim's head off.
The one wielding the blade, the doctor, is far more culpable, for he is actually doing the killing, and should know better.
This is not a recent moral development: First do no harm... The Hippocratic oath Doctors took specifically banned abortion and administering abortifacients up until relatively recently.
For Christians (and Catholics specifically), fortunately there is a route to forgiveness, if there is genuine repentance - and a halt to the evil acts. Rachel's Vineyard is one such Catholic organization to help those who had an abortion heal the damage they have caused themselves and others. There are a lot of others as well that offer help to women, to the men whose wife/partner aborted, and even to healthcare professionals who wish to "come clean" of their participation in that evil.
#12
The manual is clear. He should have kicked her out.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
02/18/2009 16:43
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#13
Richard, exactly. She should have been met with a group of priests with a bell, book and candle.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
02/18/2009 18:06
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#14
OS, I was being a bit snarky. Sorry.
I took the Hippocratic Oath that banned abortion. So did my entire class, including the several who now do abortions.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009 19:03
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Steve, sorry - its kinda easy to miss tone on the net. My apologies for jumping on this one with both feet.
As for Pelosi, she should no longer consider herself a practical catholic (meaning practicing in full communion with the Church). By her actions she has excommunicated herself, and if the Bishops had any courage at all, they would ban her from communion.
If she truly is "an ardent Catholic", being banned from full communion wiht the Church should be enough to spur (sorry for th pun) "a come to Jesus" moment.
This would certainly sort the goat from amongst the faithful flock.
President Barack Obama's plan to tackle the foreclosure crisis will spend $75 billion in an effort to prevent up to 9 million Americans from losing their homes.
In tandem, the Treasury Department said it would double the size of its lifeline to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The government, which seized the mortgage finance companies last fall, said Wednesday it would absorb up to $200 billion in losses at each company.
The plan, which Obama is releasing later Wednesday, is more ambitious than initially expected -- and more expensive. It aims to aid borrowers who owe more on their mortgages than their homes are currently worth, and borrowers who are on the verge of foreclosure.
The initiative is designed to help up to 5 million borrowers refinance, and provides incentive payments to mortgage lenders in an effort to help up to 4 million borrowers on the verge of foreclosure.
"All of us are paying a price for this home mortgage crisis," Obama says in a prepared text of remarks scheduled shortly after 12 noon EST Wednesday at a Phoenix area high school.
Headlining the plan was a $75 billion Homeowner Stability Initiative, under which would provide incentives to lenders to cut monthly mortgage payments to sustainable levels. It defines this at no more than 31 percent of a homeowners income.
Another key component: a new program aimed at helping homeowners said to be "under water" -- with dwellings whose value have sunk below the principal still owing on their mortgages. Such mortgages have traditionally been almost impossible to refinance. But the White House said its program will help 4 to 5 million families do just that.
Of the nearly 52 million U.S. homeowners with a mortgage, about 13.8 million, or nearly 27 percent, owe more on their mortgage than their house is now worth, according to Moody's Economy.com
...
Posted by: ed ||
02/18/2009
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#1
"All of us are paying a price for this home mortgage crisis," Obama says...
#4
I thing most of the foreclosure crisis is in California and Florida. It might be cheaper to transfer Frank G and other R'burgers and then drop California and Florida from the country. It would get rid of Pelosi too.
#6
There seems to be about 50 to 75 foreclosures listed in my local fishwrap every Sunday, so it's not just California. We've also lost about 7000 jobs in the last three years, as Intel, HP, SCI, and a half-dozen others have cut their workforce. The only thing keeping things from being REALLY bad is the military - there are five military installations (Cheyenne Mtn, Peterson AFB, Schreiver AFB, USAF Academy, and Fort Carson) in the local area.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
02/18/2009 21:53
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#7
LOL - thx Darrell
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/18/2009 22:18
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#2
Maybe he should inform the Big O what muzzies are doing in Europe. Oh, the Big O is too busy to see him?
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
02/18/2009 11:23
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#3
Spencer and Wilders are at about the limit of what's acceptable. I hear what they're saying but I don't like the undercurrent. They're right at the border of preaching a new intolerance to replace the old.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009 14:00
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#4
What's wrong with intolerance? Why are we obliged to tolerate those who would deny life, liberty and property to others?
#5
Steve, I'm damned intolerant of those who view me as property, or someone to be subjugated and murdered.
Which makes me completely intolerant of islamonazis, and therefore islam as practiced by at least half its adherents. (And probably 3/4 of those who attack reside in Europe.) >:-(
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
02/18/2009 16:00
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Tolerating the intolerable is intolerable.
Posted by: ed ||
02/18/2009 16:58
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#7
Intolerance is a fantastic way to win a war Steve.
It has taken Susan Erb just three years to see the value of her Merced, California, home plunge by more than half to $350,000. Next month, her mortgage payment jumps 20 percent to $3,321 and she knows she cant afford it. Her bank wont rework the loan unless she stops paying altogether.
Now I know how people feel when I go knocking on their door, said Erb, 53, a real estate agent who works for a company that notifies residents in foreclosed properties that they must vacate. Im in their shoes.
Merced, the epicenter of the U.S. foreclosure crisis, demonstrates the steep challenges President Barack Obama will face in trying to stem defaults. One in 59 housing units in the Merced metropolitan area received a foreclosure filing in January, the highest rate in the U.S., according to RealtyTrac Inc., an Irvine, California-based seller of default data. For- sale signs are everywhere and a building boom fueled by subprime mortgages has been brought to a standstill. Just 18 construction permits were issued last year. In 2005, there were 1,427.
Were ground zero, said Merced Mayor Ellie Wooten, 75. The city, population 81,000, had an unemployment rate of 15.5 percent in December, and its going to get worse, she said.
$75 Billion Plan
Obama is scheduled today to unveil a series of measures in Phoenix to reduce record home foreclosures and halt the erosion of property values. The administration is seeking to help as many as 9 million people restructure or refinance their mortgages.
The program will use $75 billion to bring down interest rates and encourage loan modifications, the Treasury Department said in a statement. The department also said it would double the amount of stock purchases of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to as much as $200 billion of each company.
The measures come amid a worsening economy and plunging home values that have put 17.6 percent of mortgage holders underwater, or owing more than their property is worth, Seattle-based Zillow.com said Feb. 3.
Modifying loans and reducing principal may not be enough to keep people in their homes and fix the housing market, said Ethan Harris, co-head of U.S. economics research for Barclays Capital Inc. in New York, in an interview.
Theres a chunk of these loans that are unsustainable, where people have gotten divorced or lost their jobs, or the loans were way beyond the borrowers capability to pay in the first place, said Harris. A lot of the loans were not designed to be repaid, they were designed to be refinanced. That works only when housing prices are going up.
Bad Loans
The sheer volume of bad loans is also a challenge, said Harris. Getting the process going is very tough to do with such volume, even when its in everybodys best interests.
U.S. homeowners lost an estimated $3.3 trillion in house value last year, real estate valuation service Zillow said. In California, the state with the most foreclosure filings, the share of underwater owners will rise to a third of all mortgage holders by the end of the year, according to data provider First American LoanPerformance of Santa Ana, California.
Merced, located about 110 miles southeast of San Francisco in Californias agricultural Central Valley, became a housing boom town in the early part of the decade as buyers with subprime loans sought affordable property within commuting distance of Bay Area job centers, said Jeff Michael of the University of the Pacifics Eberhardt School of Business in Stockton.
Median home prices in Merced rose from $150,000 in January 2002 to a peak $382,750 in December 2005, according to MDA DataQuick, a San Diego-based property research firm. In December 2008, the median stood at $120,500, down 52 percent from a year earlier, as four out of five resales involved properties that had been foreclosed on in the prior 12 months.
Subprime Loans
There were a lot of young families and first-time buyers with not a particularly high income, so it was perfect ground for subprime lending, said Michael, who directs the schools business forecasting center. You had people streaming in from the Bay Area. This was their chance to get in.
Many of the people coming to town were immigrants priced out of other parts of California. About 17 percent of Merceds population is of Laotian descent and 52 percent is Hispanic, city spokesman Mike Conway said.
Homebuilders constructed subdivisions to the north, west and east of the downtown, and today no area is untouched by the foreclosure crisis, said Brad Grant, city finance director.
Merceds general fund revenue, mostly from property and sales taxes, will drop 12 percent to $38.6 million for the fiscal year ending June 30, and will probably decline a further 7 percent next year, Grant said. The city wont fill 35 jobs and department managers are to cut budgets by 12 percent.
Job Losses
Bankrupt retailers including Mervyns LLC, Circuit City Stores Inc. and Linens n Things Inc. have cut almost 200 jobs in town, and Quebecor Inc. may close its Merced printing plant and fire about 100 workers, Wooten said.
Rina Serrano, 35, an after-school program supervisor for the Merced County Office of Education, may lose her job next year due to budget cuts. The value of her house, built by Calabasas, California-based Ryland Group Inc. in the Bellevue Ranch development, fell by at least a third since she purchased it in 2007. Her husbands cabinetmaking business is down by half.
Nobody has given us any options, but my feeling is there should be some assistance, said Serrano, 35, a mother of four. The couple took out a 30-year fixed loan and arent behind on payments but they are underwater by about $70,000.
Speculators helped drive up Merced prices during the boom, said Greg Parle, co-owner of the Branding Iron steak house on Main Street, not far from a historic courthouse built in 1875, three years after the city was established.
Tremendous Wave
We had a tremendous wave of Bay Area people coming through, and they were rolling houses, Parle said. You couldnt touch a two-bedroom condo for less than $600,000 there. But you could buy a three-bedroom house for $250,000 here.
The Obama plan probably cant help Merced residents Bountay and Khamtanh Rattanavongsa, who walked away from their adjustable-rate home loan last year and were foreclosed upon after monthly payments jumped to $3,500 from $1,800.
Theyre now renting a Bellevue Ranch house constructed by Kimball Hill Homes, the Rolling Meadows, Illinois-based homebuilder that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in December. Across the street, wooden frames of partially built two-story homes, with no windows or doors, are clustered in a former cattle pasture.
Khamtanh, 63, a retired school aide, came to the U.S. from Laos in 1978 with her husband, 60, who works as a custodian. Their son lives with them and helps pay the $1,500 rent.
I loved my house, I never thought Id lose it, Rattanavongsa said. Now I have no credit. Ive got nothing.
#1
Speculators helped drive up Merced prices during the boom,...
...who had the assistance of financiers (re:banks) and willing accomplishes in people who wanted someone else's property but without the means short of out right theft to get it. Welcome to the 'victim' culture. It's not my fault! /sarcasm off
#5
i'm with you old spook i don't feel sorry for that woman one bit. She is kinda like my sister in law who is in real estate who thought she was hot shit riding around in that $70,000 vehicle and buying the big house when things where good now whining and bitching because she cant' hardly pay the cell phone bill. tough shit
A lot of folks were nudged into mortgages that they shouldn't have taken, but it's hard to resist when the realtor, banker, and mortgage broker are telling you that it's alright and they shove a paper full of numbers in front of you to prove it. We all understand the proper use of credit, but it's not clear to some.
Add to that the desire to get away from the big city. Why were those folks leaving San Fran (or Detroit, or Gary, or New Orleans, or Chicago, or Denver, etc)? Crime. Poverty. Bad schools. High cost of living. Extraordinary high cost of housing. A 2-bedroom flat for 600K in a marginal neighborhood versus a 3-bedroom house with a backyard for 350K in a nice suburb?
Sign. me. up.
Throughout the past decade and a half the message from government, bankers, mortgage brokers and real estate workers was the same: buy, buy, buy. Don't worry, you can always re-finance or flip. It's going to go up forever, doncha know?
It didn't and now ordinary people are holding the bag. You bet it was wrong, and we all know that now, but you put that message in front of otherwise reasonable, sensible people day after day and see what happens. Especially when you reinforce that message by having people experience life in a marginal neighborhood in the big city.
I understand what happened. I don't blame the homeowners for 100% of this at all. I'm not happy that my (and my daughter's) tax dollars are going to be used to bail them out, as well as bail out the bankers and brokers, but I don't see a lot of options here.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009 14:07
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I see an alternative.
Bankruptcy.
The bankruptcy laws didn't get created in a month. They have evolved over centuries to deal with situations exactly like this. It goes for stupid, ignorant, gullible, innocent, greedy (take your pick)homeowners as well as automobile manufacturers and insurance companies. Let them all go under. Have a short, sharp panic. Let prices fall to the point where the market clears. Then begin the recovery process.
We're ultimately going to do that anyway. We're just going to make it take a lot longer and socialize the loss so that the lessons are not learned so well by those who were stupid, ignorant, gullible, innocent, greedy.
And those who weren't learn a whole lot of lessons about how it doesn't pay not to be an idiot when every one else is because you end up picking up the tab anyway. It's sort of like how you order at a restaurant when you all agree that the bill will be divided by the number of people attending as opposed to separate checks.
OS is close. Screw the debtors who can't pay off and the creditors who lent to them. Even the ones in Colorado.
#8
Especially when you reinforce that message by having people experience life in a marginal neighborhood in the big city.
My ancestors faced that, but instead pulled up stakes and really moved, not out to the burbs, but across an ocean. There is plenty of less expensive housing all around the country in non-threatening environments, but no big city or California Dreaming(tm) perks. If a million people want to live in the same spot, even a dump is going to be expensive. If 25,000 people want to live somewhere, you can expect to see a lot more for a lot less money. It was just as much about ego and status as it was about property. Entitlement(tm) versus you get what you earn by your own labor.
#9
All that's been said here in the 'Berg has been right on, but it won't change anything. Obambi hasn't done the one think that is ESSENTIAL to put an end to this "cricis" - gut the Community Reinvestment law. As long as the Federal Government continues to force banks to make bad loans, the results will continue to unfold exactly the same way. Nobody in Congress even dares BREATHE a word about repealing CRE, yet it was the prime perpetrator of today's debacle.
I've been paying an extra $50 principle on my mortgage for the last 12 years. The result is that I'll have my mortgage paid off COMPLETELY six years early. It's been tight here a few times, where beans and rice was the menu several nights in a row, but the mortgage always got paid.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
02/18/2009 22:11
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The MV Faina cargo have been fully loaded on rail wagons ready for onward transfer to the Kahawa Barracks in Nairobi. So...will this be the first stop or the final destination?
Sources say the cargo is awaiting an official flag off to start the trip anytime later Tuesday or early Wednesday. The consignment aboard the Ukrainian ship included anti-aircraft guns mounted on four-wheel carriages, rocket propelled grenades, an armoured truck and spare parts. Military officials, led by Colonel George Kabugi, Deputy Commander of the Kenya Army Armoured Brigade, told journalists that they were happy to receive the cargo. Yes, yes! We love the big toys!
When the vessel arrived, Defence Assistant Minister David Musila said the equipment would be transported to Kahawa Garrison and then to Isiolo and Lanet Army barracks.
The exercise was interrupted several times due to tidal waves on the ocean and other logistic hiccups.
The Belize-flagged MV Faina which remained in the control of pirates for 134 days was released on February 5 after the owners paid a $3.2 million ransom to the buccaneers.
#1
Of chief international interest among the stores were a number of T-72 main battle tanks (MBTs), which were at the centre of diplomatic and media attention when Faina was seized by Somali pirates in September 2008. Local sources put the number of MBTs at 33, supported by an unknown number of anti-aircraft gun systems, believed to be ZPU-4 quad-barrelled 14.5 mm towed anti-aircraft guns, and stocks of small arms.
Kenya has repeatedly issued claims to be the end user of the weapons, but Jane's sources state that this is, in fact, the third and final batch of MBTs and heavy weapons ordered for use in southern Sudan.
#1
"The sell-off came despite with the signing of the $787 billion stimulus pork and patronage package by President Obama ... which will suck $787 Billion from the private sector crippling recovery efforts."
ESSENCE.com asked the civil rights leader and founder of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition, Inc. to pen an "open letter to President Barack Obama." With the passion Jackson is known for, he asks the nation's first Black President to carefully examine important policies including those relating to the economy, education and Voting Rights Act.
Dear Mr. President:
What a joy and relief it is to be able to salute you as President Obama. Congratulations on a magnificently run campaign. Your discipline, vision, strength and courage will take America and the world a long way. Now that we have made it through the courtship of the primary season, the engagement party in Grant Park on November 4th, and the wedding on January 20th, we're entering into marriage--the final stage, one that is full of challenges.
It's high noon in our politics, where hope abounds. But it is midnight in our economics. But we have hope that the darkness will lead to a new light that will shine even brighter. We are in a time of the worst economic crisis of the last half century, and amid expanding wars and conflicts in Iraq, the Middle East and Africa. The two great themes of ending poverty at home and unnecessary wars abroad must dominate our priorities.
We need an economic stimulus. We also need equal protection under the law, which we've never had. Those who have been dealt the most inequality deserve targeted stimulation. Our character is measured, as you mentioned in your Inauguration speech, by how we treat the least of these. The least of these are gripped in poverty, high infant mortality, less access to capital, first-class jails and second-class schools, the highest victims of home foreclosures. They need targeted job creation and job training to offset targeted discrimination and denial leading to structural inequality. They need to be able to restructure and modify their loans, real foreclosure relief to save their homes.
Mr. President, I applaud your recent proposals to recommit our nation to education and invest in our most valuable asset, our youth. As you do, I'd like you to consider the RainbowPush Education Stimulus Plan, a simple yet sweeping plan to help families finance college costs that are steadily putting higher education out of the reach of most Americans. I propose that students holding and applying for college loans should be offered interest rates that do not exceed 1 percent--the same favorable terms that are being offered to large banks by the federal government. It's simply a matter of fairness.
Currently, students are generally forced to borrow loans with interest rates that range from 4 to 8 percent. Since that's inadequate to pay the costs of tuition and housing, most of them borrow from the commercial banks with 12 to 14 percent interest rates. Yet, these are the same banks that can borrow from the federal government at 1 percent interest; it's like scalping students. Many students must also finance their education with credit cards that carry interest rates of 20 percent or higher. As you know from your personal experience, graduating students will be saddled with debt for decades to come.
It gets worse when the students who get the loan cannot start payments within six months and are then penalized. As jobs are leaving, chances are they cannot start working in six months and need a longer grace period. Furthermore, the schools that lend them the money are penalized if students default on their loans; this pattern must end.
Through this 1 percent student loan program, along with the expansion of the Pell Grant program, which should correspond with the cost of the average college education, these programs will go a long way in developing the next generation of intellectual talent and leaders of our nation. This is an opportunity we cannot afford to pass up. We must go another way and seek the change that you eloquently talked about and promised.
Section Five Voting Rights Act, the key to political enfranchisement for all Americans, is now in peril as the Supreme Court reviews its validity. We must fight for the Voting Rights Act and prevail. Lyndon Johnson was right in his vision of a Great Society and the War on Poverty. We must build up on that great democratic tradition and carry it forward today.
Lifting the boats at the bottom is our moral challenge. Our foreign policy must place a priority on the escalating Middle East crisis which affects the whole region. One thousand lives were lost in the Gaza crisis while 3,000 died from cholera in Zimbabwe. Children in Haiti--100 miles off our shores--are eating mud pies as a staple. We must have one set of rules and standards and not lure Cubans to come to U.S. as refugees, and then deport or jail Haitians.
Twisting words sometimes has deadly consequences. What is an economic political refuge? Well, they are all human beings fleeing for their lives.
We're anxious to work with you, Mr. President. To follow through on Dr. King's last message, brought forward on his last birthday celebration, let us gather the moral courage to end poverty at home and end unnecessary wars abroad. I'm convinced that, yes, we can. We will. We must.
Keep hope alive.
Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.
President and Founder
RainbowPUSH Coalition, Inc.
"We're anxious to work with you" Rantburg translation - we need job appointments in your administration and free money.
#2
PUSH will get part of ARRA - probably in the mulit-millions. ACORN is set for up to $3 billion. I have applied for $200 million and am fairly certain I have a good chance to get it. I told them I was a stockholder in the First Rantburg Bank of Florida and we forgot our FDIC premium and were now exposed to our depositors commenters.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
02/18/2009 9:48
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SAN'A, Yemen -- A former Saudi Guantanamo Bay detainee who later went to Yemen to become an al-Qaida field commander has surrendered and was handed over to Saudi authorities on Tuesday, Yemen's Interior Ministry said.
Abu al-Hareth Muhammad al-Oufi a.k.a., Muhamad Attik al-Harbi, a.k.a., detainee 333
was one of two Saudi ex-Guantanamo detainees who re-emerged as al-Qaida operatives last month in a militant video released a day after President Barack Obama signed an executive order directing the closure of the prison at the U.S. naval base in Cuba within a year. Saudi Arabia also named al-Oufi on a recently released list of 85 most-wanted men who had fled abroad.
Saudi government officials confirmed he surrendered and was handed over to Saudi authorities in order to contact his family and return to his former rehabilitation center, according to the official Saudi Press Agency.
#2
Word up here is they wanna dump the Globe, the Worcester Telegram and their 18% share of the Red Sox.
Outside of the Red Sox, good luck finding a buyer...
To put that valuation in perspective, consider the following: The Times paid $1.1 billion for the Globe in 1993 and another $296 million for the T&G in 2000. Those assets are now worth roughly $192.8 million and $18 million, respectively, according to Barclays Capital analyst Craig Huber.
Huber also estimated the newspaper publishers 17.8 percent equity stake in the Red Sox and affiliated properties would fetch $150 million after taxes. That puts a market value on the Red Sox of more than $1 billion. The New York Times Co. bought the stake in New England Sports Ventures, which includes the Red Sox and other assets, in 2002 for $75 million and now has a private market value of $200 million, Huber said.
#3
The Worcester Telegram is my local paper. It is actually almost, sort of, closer to the middle of the road than the NYT or BG. It is very easy to see what are the NYT driven slants and what are the more balanced local takes on things. I would like it to return to its previous incarnation before the Globe bought it.
#4
The NYT is still attacking the Bush administration and especially Dick Cheney. How hard is it to report current events, or offer editorials on current events? For that matter, how hard is it for a newspaper in American to be pro-American?
HAMPSHIRE soldiers were among troops who seized more than £50m worth of drugs during an operation in Afghanistan.
1st Battalion The Princess of Wales Royal Regiment, known as the Tigers, were among 700 troops that took part in Operation Diesel which captured four drugs factories in Helmand Province and disrupted Taliban facilities making improvised bombs.
Troops carried out raids in the notorious Sangin Valley which the Ministry of Defence described as the ''Taliban heartland''.
The Hampshire-based soldiers provided a decoy, feigning a move into an area to the north of the real targets.
While distracted the true attacks took place forcing the Taliban to abandon the factories, weapons and drugs equipment.
Along with £50m worth of heroin and drug-making equipment troops also seized weapons and ammunition, including Ak47 assault rifles, PKM machine guns, numerous ammunition magazines and 3 RPG rocket launchers complete with additional warheads.
A motorbike modified for use in a suicide attack was also seized.
Defence Secretary John Hutton praised the bravery of British troops and said the drug seizures would starve the Taliban of funding and prevent drugs reaching UK streets.
Commander Task Force Helmand, Brigadier Gordon Messenger of the Royal Marines, described Operation Diesel as ''a clinical precision strike'' which had given a significant boost to the Afghan authorities in their fight against the drugs trade.
Operation Diesel which took place between February 6 and 11 involved Afghan Security Forces and British troops from 45 Commando Royal Marines, 42 Commando Group Royal Marines, 3 Commando Brigade's Reconnaissance Force, 1st Battalion The Princess of Wales Royal Regiment and the Armoured Support Group.
#1
This is nothing against the men of the batallion and I understand the traditions involved but the "Princess of Wales" Regiment? I can only imagine our own 1st Marine Regiment being renamed the "Michelle Obama Brigade".
Maydan Shahr, Afghanistan - The 3,000 new American troops who arrived in recent weeks in Logar and Wardak provinces, both of which border Kabul, face a formidable challenge: establishing control in areas with little government presence and where insurgents operate freely.
In Band-e-chak, for example, a district capital in Wardak, gun-toting Taliban fighters regularly come into town on their motorbikes to do some shopping. They buy their produce and go home, driving past government offices unmolested.
These provinces could be a key testing ground for the Obama administration's Afghan strategy, which may include a surge of thousands of US forces countrywide.
"Policymakers in Washington will be watching the progress there closely," says Habibullah Rafeh, political analyst with the Afghan Academy of Sciences. "If [the US] can turn things around there, they can create the momentum to turn around the whole war."
The strategy in Logar and Wardak will be to push the insurgents out of their strongholds and eliminate their contact with locals, and to emphasize development and reconstruction, says Col. David Haight, commander of the newly arrived troops.
Insurgents' expanding control
Unlike areas of the Afghan south, such as Kandahar, the provinces close to Kabul were free from a sizeable insurgent presence until the last couple of years. The deteriorating security here mirrors the trends of worsening violence nationwide over the past year, where record numbers of foreign soldiers and civilians were killed.
In Wardak Province, insurgents today control six out of nine districts, according to interviews with locals and government officials here. They also control four out of seven districts in Logar Province, locals say. Parallel governments exist in each of these districts, with the Afghan government nominally occupying the district capitals but allowing the Taliban to operate freely.
Residents of Band-e-chak, the capital of Chak district, say the local government made an agreement with the Taliban. "They leave each other alone, so there is no fighting between the two sides," says Fazel Minallah. "Sometimes when officials from Kabul visit, the Taliban leave and the [district government] puts a bunch of police in the streets and everyone pretends there is no problem."
One other Wardak district even lacks a Kabul-appointed governor, leaving only the Taliban administration.
Complex militant networks
In addition to dealing with corrupt and ineffective local governments, US forces will have to contend with a collection of insurgent forces with different tactics and ideologies.
In Logar Province, the Haqqani network is the dominant insurgent group, according to intelligence officials. This network has sympathies with Al Qaeda and is considered one of the most dangerous insurgent outfits. Authorities say it may have been behind the daring simultaneous attack on three government offices in Kabul last week, for example.
Here in Wardak, the rebel group Hizb-i-Islami controls two districts and the Taliban four. Hizb-i-Islami was a leading guerrilla force that fought against the Soviet invasion in the 1980s and maintains ties from that time.
The rebels' ranks here are drawn mostly from the local population, unlike some other provinces where the Taliban imports fighters. "This could make it harder for the US to separate the insurgents from the population and isolate them," says Waliullah Rahmani, an insurgency expert with the Kabul Center for Strategic Studies.
Like elsewhere, Wardak and Logar are home to a bewildering array for tribes, each carrying a complex history of rivalries and allegiances.
A group of tribes here, which locals call the Maidani, has historically supported Hizb-i-Islami and contributes fighters to its ranks. Other tribes have allegiances with the Taliban and still others support the Afghan government.
Locals wary of more foreign troops
Washington's biggest challenge, however, may be winning the support of a local population that is wary of American troops. "I had a meeting with my constituents," says Roshanak Wardak, a member of parliament from Wardak Province. "They were completely, 100 percent against the arrival of foreign troops."
"People are worried that the injection of more troops will bring more civilian casualties," says Muhammad Hazrat Janan, a member of Wardak's provincial council.
"We don't want more fighting here," says Najibullah, a taxi driver. "When the Americans come, the Taliban attacks us." The others in his car nod in agreement.
But already 3,000 troops have landed in these provinces. They belong to the Army's 10th Mountain Division, which was slated for Iraq until being diverted to Afghanistan last September.
Colonel Haight says he recognizes the problem of local hostility. "You won't be able to build trust overnight. It will take some time." "We need to push into the villages," he adds. "We have to get out there and show the benefits of our presence." These benefits will include fostering development and better governance, he says, to go along with traditional combat operations.
"They got the groceries here," he explains, referring to farm produce. "They can get it out of the ground, they just can't get it to the market." The two provinces have few usable roads and related facilities. US forces here plan to facilitate infrastructure development, which officials contend will lead to more economic opportunities for the locals.
"He who creates jobs is going to win this war," says Haight. "The Taliban can't create jobs, but if we can, it can make a real difference." In addition, the Americans plan to help build the capacity of Afghan government.
They are meeting regularly with Wardak's governor Muhammad Halim Fedayee. "I have been focused on getting qualified staff and creating a transparent and accountable government," Mr. Fedayee says. "If the Americans don't continue this approach, we are all in trouble."
Debate over arming Afghans
US officials are also backing the creation of an armed paramilitary force in Wardak known as the Afghan Protection Force. Village elders will nominate groups of young men, who will be vetted, trained, armed, and given a uniform by the Ministry of Interior. These groups will be tasked with providing neighborhood security there are only 460 police officers for the more than half a million people there and acting as a "holding force" in areas where insurgents are cleared out, according to Afghan officials.
While the plan is popular with locals who see the possibility of jobs in a province where they are scarce, many analysts say there are dangers in providing weapons to tribesmen in a region awash with arms and in a country with a history of civil war.
Government officials in Wardak, however, support the initiative. "The US should be helping support all local Afghan security forces, instead of sending in troops," says provincial council member Mr. Janan.
The provincial council is an elected body that advises the provincial governor. As the Taliban increased its hold over Wardak, council members started to leave the province. Now, none of the nine members even live in Wardak they've all relocated to Kabul.
"My family can't stay there anymore," Janan says. "We just sit and wait for the day that we can return."
It's time to shut down Hezbollah and Hamas broadcasts to the Continent.
By Mark Dubowitz and Roberta Bonazzi
Their propaganda notwithstanding, Hamas and, two years ago, Hezbollah suffered devastating military defeats that may diminish their ability to attack Israel with rocket fire. But these Iranian-backed terrorist organizations are deploying another dangerous weapon in their war against Western democracies -- terrorist television stations.
Thanks to Arab satellite companies, Hezbollah's al-Manar and Hamas's al-Aqsa TV stations can still beam their incitement and hatred into European living rooms, radicalizing Muslim immigrants throughout the Continent.
Al-Manar, however, is not a mere propaganda tool. Founded in 1991 by Hezbollah guerillas, it is an operational weapon in the hands of a deadly terrorist organization. Following a 2006 letter to then-President George W. Bush signed by a majority of the U.S. Senate, including Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, the U.S. Treasury Department designated al-Manar as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist entity. This designation placed, for the first time, a media outlet on the same terrorism list as al Qaeda, Hamas and Hezbollah itself.
The designation highlighted the role of al-Manar as more than just a station with objectionable content. The Hezbollah outlet was actively involved in recruiting and fund raising for Hezbollah, and providing preoperational surveillance for terror attacks. Undersecretary of Treasury Stuart Levey has observed that al-Manar is an "entity maintained by a terrorist group" and is therefore "as culpable as the terrorist group itself."
Europe has also taken several steps against al-Manar. In 2004, the European Union and the governments of France, Spain and Holland determined that al-Manar violated a European law prohibiting incitement to hatred in broadcasting. This encouraged European satellite providers Eutelsat, Globecast, Hispasat and New Skies Satellite to cease transmission of the station.
Five non-European satellite providers have ended their broadcast of al-Manar, and multinational corporations discontinued about $4 million in annual advertising on the channel after their ad buys on Hezbollah television were exposed. In December 2008, two U.S. residents pleaded guilty in Southern District Court in New York to material support for Hezbollah after they were found to be broadcasting al-Manar and selling satellite equipment.
Yet the Saudi-based, Arab League-owned Arabsat and the Egyptian government-owned Nilesat still allow al-Manar to broadcast incitement and violence to Europe's Muslim population on their satellites. During the 2006 Danish cartoon controversy, for example, Hezbollah's Sheikh Nasrallah urged al-Manar's viewers "to take a decisive stand." He said that "hundreds of millions of Muslims are ready and willing to sacrifice their lives in order to defend the honor of their Prophet. And you are among them."
Al-Manar has become alarmingly popular with Europe's young Arabic-speaking Muslims. On one German television program, young Muslims in Berlin cited al-Manar as a factor influencing their hatred of the U.S. and Jews. In November 2008, Germany banned the terrorist station on the basis that it promoted the use of violence. This ban prohibits al-Manar from doing business in the country, although its hate and incitement are still accessible in Germany via Arabsat and Nilesat.
Hamas, designated by both Europe and the U.S. as a terrorist entity, followed al-Manar and took its own brand of jihad to the airwaves in 2006. Today, Hamas's al-Aqsa television disseminates its violent message on Arabsat. Eutelsat, France's leading satellite operator and the world's third-largest satellite company, also began broadcasting al-Aqsa on its Atlantic Bird 4 and Eurobird 2 satellites, enabling Hamas to incite, recruit and raise funds throughout Europe, the Middle East and North Africa.
Al-Aqsa TV is notorious for its uninterrupted speeches of Hamas leaders calling for suicide bombings, for its youth-oriented music videos that incite viewers to murder, and programs aimed at children which glorify suicide bombers. Faced with world-wide outcry for using Disney-like characters, the show's producers dropped the Mickey Mouse character -- they told kids that Israel had killed the popular rodent -- and found bees, bunnies and other animals to tout the virtues of jihad.
Policy makers, law enforcement officials and regulators should be worried about al-Aqsa, but so should every European parent. One haunting music video produced by al-Aqsa shows a mother preparing a bomb in her bedroom. Her young daughter naively asks whether she is bringing her a toy. Mama leaves home and explodes on her suicide mission. Her child says, "Instead of me, you carried bombs in your hand. . . . Only now I know what was more precious than me." The little girl continues, "My love for Muhammad will not be merely words. I am following mama in her steps."
Another broadcast shows mothers donning suicide belts and calling on women and girls to blow themselves up. The "martyrs" are assured that the "Zionist Entity" will be destroyed.
Al-Aqsa is an integral part of Hamas's global strategy of radicalizing Muslims, subverting the peace process, raising funds for future attacks, and disseminating propaganda in the Palestinian territories and beyond. Like al-Manar, it is an operational weapon in the hands of a deadly terrorist organization.
While "free speech" activists decry action against these terrorist media outlets, European officials should recall prior campaigns against enemy media outlets. In 1999, during the Kosovo war, NATO planes bombed the Belgrade-based headquarters of Radio Television of Serbia. While 16 employees were killed, NATO defended the action as a legitimate attack against Serbian broadcasting of Slobodan Milosevic's violent call to arms against Kosovo's Muslims.
European states also have prosecuted hate speech as a war crime, first at the Nuremberg trials against Nazi officials after World War II and then at an international court in Tanzania in 2003, when three Rwandan media executives were convicted of running a radio station and publishing a newspaper calling for the systematic extermination of Rwanda's Tutsis. In supporting the convictions, Reed Brody, legal counsel to Human Rights Watch, said, "If you fan the flames, you'll have to face the consequences."
Europe can act against Hamas TV under its own legal authority governing television broadcasting. France should enforce the warning its own audiovisual authority issued on Dec. 2, 2008, warning Eutelsat that al-Aqsa programming violates French communications law. Eutelsat's recent decision to stop distributing al-Aqsa on only one of its satellites is not sufficient compliance, and Eutelsat should be held accountable for its continued broadcasting of al-Aqsa.
In his inaugural address, President Barack Obama called for "a new way forward" with the Muslim world. But he also called for a strong defense against those who "seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents" and addressed leaders "who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society's ills on the West." Working with Cairo and Riyadh to cease satellite broadcasts of these Iranian-backed, terrorist-owned media channels is key to addressing the radicalization threat in Europe for the continent's leaders. But France should first get its own terrorist-media house in order.
A Spanish soldier and his Russian girlfriend were arrested on Tuesday for posting videos on the Internet calling for Islamist attacks in Spain, the National Police said.
Christian Peso Ruiz and Maria Choubina, both 24, were arrested in the city of Granada in Andalusia over the videos, which called for the recovery of territories in Spain -- known as Al Andalus -- which were under Muslim rule for hundreds of years, the police said in a news release. "They wanted to use the Internet to distribute messages to encourage people in the Muslim world to carry out terrorist attacks in Spain, mixing nostalgic calls for the liberation of Al Andalus with praise of terrorists," the police said.
The pair posted up to 11 videos which received more than 2,000 hits.
#3
Don't charge him, just ship him and his "girlfriend" to Pakistan on a one-way ticket. I'm sure they'd be welcomed with open arms in the NWFP.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
02/18/2009 11:55
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#4
"christian" and "maria"??? Weird. When I read the title, i thought it may be a moroccan soldier from the spanish foreign legion, but this one is weird? Did they convert, and only their actual names are given, not their new muslim (IE arab) ones?
#5
Btw, spanish muslim converts are supposed to be very active, especially in latin america. There's one group in particular, whose name I actually knew, but my mind is rotten by pr0n, which is an "historical" muslim converts org (sometime in the late 70's/80's, not from the post-2001), which evangelizes latin america, stressing the "muslim roots" of latin people, targeting native indians,... this is the theory to which hugo chavez once referred to, when he spoke of those "muslim roots" (not that he cares much, since he's an ethnonationalist demagogue blaming whitey and courting injuns).
Very unsurprisingly, this group originated in leftists who opposed Franco (though not very successfully, obviously), and became disenchanted when Change & Hope came, and this wasn't the marxist Utopia they thought would come. Some people just don't like Western civilization commies foremost.
What a joke. Your Congress has voted to spend almost $790 billion of your money on a stimulus package that not a single member of either chamber has read.
The 1,073-page document wasn't posted on the government's Web site until after 10 p.m. the day before the vote to pass it was taken. I don't care if you're Evelyn Wood, you can't read almost 1,100 pages of the lawyer talk that makes up all legislation in eight or 10 hours.
The criminal part of this boondoggle is divided into two parts. The first is the Democrats promised to post the bill a full 48 hours before the vote was taken to allow members of the public to see what they were getting for their money. Both parties voted unanimously to do this ... and they lied.
It didn't happen. Why am I not surprised? Congress lying to the American people has become part of their job description. They can't be trusted on anything anymore.
I'm sure part of the reason there was no time for the public to read the bill was the 11th-hour internecine warfare between House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
When Reid first announced the compromise had been reached, Nancy Pelosi was nowhere to be seen. And it would take an act of God for this egotistical, arrogant woman to miss a photo op where she could take credit for anything. But she wasn't there.
She summoned Reid to her office, where unnamed sources said she blew her top over some provision for schools that she wasn't happy with. Pelosi's snit delayed everything.
It's really too bad President Obama couldn't figure out a way to jettison these two who are poster children for everything that is wrong in Washington. The Associated Press called the birth of the stimulus bill "sausage making" in the best tradition of Washington politics as usual.
The second part of the crime is the contents of the bill itself. Far from being only about jobs, infrastructure and tax cuts as promised, the stimulus bill stimulates a bunch of other stuff as well. Eight billion dollars for high-speed rail lines, including a proposed line between Las Vegas and Los Angeles. This little bit of second story work wasn't even in the House version of the bill. iReport.com: So many things to do, what would you fix first?
It started in the Senate as a $2 billion project, and came out of the conference committee costing a whopping $8 billion. Gee, now who would that benefit? Oh yeah, the Senate majority leader is from Nevada.
Filipino veterans, most of whom don't live in the U.S., will get $200 million in compensation for World War II injuries. And: $2 billion in grants and loans for battery companies, $100 million for small shipyards and a rollback of the alternative minimum tax at a cost of some $70 billion.
The AMT provision is much-needed legislation, but it doesn't belong in the stimulus bill. It forced other things out so Congress could keep to its self-imposed $800 billion cap.
And when it comes to the tax cuts contained in the stimulus bill, experts have determined they will amount to about $13 per week after taxes for the average American. I'm not sure how much stimulation $13 a week buys. It depends on the neighborhood.
The biggest problem of all is the stimulus bill may not be nearly enough. And if the president has to come back asking for more, the next time might not be so easy.
So far, we have an anemic stimulus bill and some sort of vague proposal from the secretary of the Treasury to deal with the banking crisis -- a proposal that landed with a thud last week -- as the two first steps toward solving a financial crisis that is threatening to take down the country.
Obama better step up his game, or it's going to be a short four years in office.
#1
Yowza! Blue on blue when you consider Cafferty's prior porter service to Obama and Dems baggage. And he is nailing Pelosi as "arrogant and egotistical"? A double Yowza! I think this is more of a preemptive protective shield around Obama. CNN is more interested in protecting him then in celebrating Reid/Pelosi legislation that they know and everyone knows will not work.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
02/18/2009 10:02
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It's really too bad President Obama couldn't figure out a way to jettison these two who are poster children for everything that is wrong in Washington.
Nothing to disagree with here. Maybe California and Nevada will come to realize this too before pigs fly or the second coming.
A Quebec man dedicated his life to spreading propaganda for al-Qaeda and other jihadists, according to a controversial expert testifying at the man's trial. Rita Katz, the director of the Search for International Terrorist Entities, or SITE Intelligence Group, said Saïd Namouh was one of the most eager, fervent and trusted participants in an online cell dedicated to promoting al-Qaeda and other Islamic terror groups.
Mr. Namouh has been charged with four terror-related offences for allegedly acting as a propaganda wing for terrorists and Iraqi insurgents and for an alleged plot to set off a bomb in Vienna. He has admitted to taking part in hundreds of pro-jihad discussions on the Internet under the name Ashraf in 2007, but Ms. Katz testified the chatter was more than idle.
Ashraf was one of 73 members of the Khidemat forum, an online workshop for the Global Islamic Media Front. The front "is the oldest and most prominent of the virtual propaganda groups supporting the international jihad," Ms. Katz wrote in report presented in court yesterday. "It served as the official media outlet for terrorist organizations," she added in testimony.
Writing as Ashraf from his home in central Quebec, Mr. Namouh submitted 1,075 postings to the site about a year. Ms. Katz said he was responsible for distributing hundreds of videos of terrorist propaganda through direct copies and Internet links. The productions included instructions for making a suicide bomber's vest, a kidnapping video of BBC journalist Alan Johnston and a threat directed at Germany and Austria warning them of terrorist attacks if they failed to withdraw from Afghanistan. "He even commented on the excellent international media uproar that video created," Ms. Katz said.
Ashraf also got into the occasional spat with other group members for their lack of zeal. "Ashraf ... played a prominent role within the Global Islamic Media Front, and was trusted and respected by other members," Ms. Katz wrote.
Ms. Katz, who entered the courtroom by a back door under heavy security, has spent more than a decade tailing jihadists online. Fluent in Arabic, she was born in Iraq, raised in Israel, and started a private intelligence agency in the U.S. in 2002. She won admiration in some intelligence circles for quickly delivering threat analysis and al-Qaeda video to law enforcement, governments and media. Critics have accused her of being an alarmist who gives jihad wannabes an oversized platform.
Ms. Katz wore a disguise including a wig and a fake nose on 60 Minutes to promote her book, Terrorist Hunter, in 2003. She was sued over allegations she made on the program that a U.S. chicken farm was being used to launder terrorist money.
She faced another setback in 2004 when she spent months helping the U.S. Department of Justice prepare a case against an Idaho computer scientist accused of giving material support to terrorists. A jury acquitted him. In 2007, the White House leaked a video of Osama Bin Laden, which Ms. Katz's firm had clandestinely obtained and passed along. She complained the leak destroyed SITE's capacity to infiltrate al-Qaeda online.
Ms. Katz is the final Crown witness in the case against Mr. Namouh. His defence lawyer has not said if Mr. Namouh will testify.
MAGAZINES are generally seen as good early warning signs for economic downturns. The thinking is that corporations would rather cut back on ads before they actually have to start cutting back on people.
If that thinking holds, we're in for a long and deep recession.
Tomorrow, Media Industry Newsletter is releasing its report on the first quarter of 2009 and it will show ad pages have tumbled a numbing 21.5 percent for monthlies in the period compared with the first quarter of 2008. (MIN gets early numbers because the March issues are starting to hit newsstands.)
In comparison, in the first quarter of 2008 magazines had just gone negative, dropping 4.6 percent after racking up small gains for most of 2007. Ad pages have now been falling for five straight quarters, MIN reports.
What is most upsetting in the latest wipeout is that virtually no category of magazine is spared. "Never have there been advertising performances so weak that just 13 out of the 160 monthlies are up through the first quarter," MIN reported.
Newsweeklies are decimated. Time is down 47.7 percent through its Feb. 16 issue and Newsweek is down 37.6 percent through the same period. Not surprisingly business/finance titles are bleeding: BusinessWeek is off 34.8 percent; Forbes is down 33.1 percent and Fortune is 24.9 percent below last year.
So what's looking good? Guns & Ammo is up 7.4 percent.
Sexy women? It depends. Penthouse is up 12.3 percent but rival Playboy is down 22.1 percent in ad pages. The red hot Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue, which hit newsstands last week, dwarfs both of them with 203 ad pages, but that's down 28.8 percent from a year ago when it had 285 ad pages. SI reports its online traffic has tripled versus 2008.
General car books are getting hammered as expected with Automobile, Road & Track and Motor Trend all down more than 30 percent, but not everything requiring fuel is sputtering. A few specialized pursuits are making it. Motorcylist is up 9.4 percent and Sport Truck is up 3.3 percent.
One potentially encouraging sign: kids and family seem to be getting more attention. Family Circle is up 5.4 percent, National Geographic Kids is up 1.9 percent while Sports Illustrated Kids is up 29.6 percent.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
02/18/2009 5:11
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#2
"Johnson! You know what we need? Another fullpage adoring cover picture of President Obama!"
"Sir, that will make 47 weeks in a row...."
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/18/2009 7:21
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#3
Things be tuff all over. Jet, Ebony Magazine to reorganize.
The ranks of Ebony and Jet magazines have been shaken up, with cuts that include the elimination of the publications' editorial director.
According to a report published Monday on the Web site for the Maynard Institute, an organization dedicated to diversity training in the news media, employees who were cut may be able to apply for new positions.
The company is executing a multi-phase reorganization," according to a statement, of which employees were notified last week.
The company, Johnson Publishing, ranked No. 1 on Crains 2008 list of Chicagos largest minority-owned companies. With $453.3 million in revenue in 2007, the company beat out Oprah Winfreys Harpo Inc.
But Ebony and Jet, which target the African-American community, have struggled amid a turbulent economy and declining print advertising sales throughout the media industry. Ebonys ad sales dropped almost 19% to $14.9 million in 2008, according to Magazine Publishers of America data. Advertising revenue for Jet sank 41% to $5.7 million in 2008.
"Newsweeklies" are garbage by the time they are printed.
Some openly partisan ones, like ObamaweekSocialstweek Newsweek, have taken an overt lefty tilt and are failing even faster than their tacitly lefty competitors (Time).
A Pakistani envoy has urged Dhaka to let "bygones be bygones" as he rejected Bangladeshi calls for help in prosecuting alleged war criminals. "That was a long time ago..."
Bangladesh's new government has said it will try suspected war criminals for murder, rape and arson committed in 1971. "We were all much younger then..."
Mirza Zia Ispahani, a special envoy of Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari to Bangladesh, said on late Monday both nations should now look to the future. Ispahani said former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf apologised for the war when he visited Bangladesh during his tenure. "Most people nowadays don't know any of the dead. We've all gotten on with our lives."
The Pakistan envoy's comments came after Bangladeshi police arrested two men on Saturday suspected of war crimes in the 1971 conflict. They were the first arrests since 1975 when thousands of suspected war criminals were pardoned. The plan to try the suspects follows pledges by newly elected Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and appeals by veterans of the conflict. "You should, too. It's not good for you to hold all those nasty old memories."
War crimes were a big factor in December's general elections, when veterans addressed a series of nationwide rallies telling young voters that this was the "last chance" to try suspects. A private War Crimes Fact Finding Committee recently unveiled a list of 1,775 people it alleges were war criminals. "You'll get a neurosis."
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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Stopping what it called a "massive ongoing fraud," the Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday accused Robert Allen Stanford, the chief of the Stanford Financial Group, of fraud in the sale of about $8 billion of high-yielding certificates of deposit held in the firm's bank in Antigua. Also named in the suit were two other executives and some affiliates of the financial group.
Wonder where Andy Cuomo and Eliott Spitzer were all those years ...
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
They've got nothing on Congress which is running a $787B fraud.
#2
The extent of the fallout isn't known yet. Looks like Antigua Race Week has got problems with their largest supporter. They do provide the money for the parties. However he is also the largest employer in Antigua, so there may be large indirect consequences. He owns the Bank of Antigua as well as Stanford International. Lots of folks in Antigua could have all their money with him. I suspect there will be a large fallout. Stanford International Bank is no longer paying out for their CD's. The bank has been taken over by the courts. 30,000 customers in 131 countries!! The bank also had a 400K loss with Madoff, even though the bank web site says that they had no losses. The region has already had riots, mostly black on white, when the dockworkers were on strike and all those imported goods not distributed. This could get real ugly.
We've all been taught never to sign any document we haven't read. But that doesn't apply to the economic stimulus bill President Obama is signing today in Denver.
At 1,079 pages, the legislation hardly qualifies as a quick read. Sure, President Obama has a good idea of what's in the bill, but he hasn't read it page for page, which is not unusual. Rarely, if ever, does a president read a lengthy bill in its entirety before signing it into law.
So how does Mr. Obama know it's okay to sign? "He has a team of the best legislative and economic experts in the country who advise him," says White House Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton. Yeah. That's what worries us...
But mistakes do happen. Last May, Congress had to re-vote on the 1,768-page Farm Bill because 34 pages were missing from the version originally enacted into law.
If you want to read the stimulus bill for yourself, it's on the web at the Library of Congress website. Type in the bill's number: H.R. 1. The bill is even longer on the web — because it has about 670 pages of material that was struck out and replaced. Or you can print a copy. It might make a nice belated Valentine's Day for someone. Or not.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#1
"He has a team of the best legislative and economic experts in the country who advise him" -- the cream of the crap.
#2
So how does Mr. Obama know it's okay to sign? "He has a team of the best legislative and economic experts in the country who advise him,"
Yep as predicted "His handlers tell him what to do"
Posted by: Rednek Jim ||
02/18/2009 0:58
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This is his out if there is some of the pork get attention. It is his disclaimer and he will say, "I did not read it and my staff missed it". The kool-aid drinkers will rejoice in the one's honesty, and the pork will get pulled from the bill and slipped into a different bill as a rider. He is slicker than Bill Clinton.
In his signing speach he said,"This is the end" then he paused. A truth beyond words.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
02/18/2009 1:46
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Long as it doesn't drive up the price of beer and oysters, I think we're OK.
#8
OS I've been after that for 40 years and I don't think there's a chance in hell short of revolution.
My fear is that a new Constitutional Convention would just get us the same kind of positive rights crap you see in Europe where every good thing becomes a mandated "right". Gov't will be required to feed, clothe and shelter everyone. The idea that a constitution enumerates the RESTRICTIONS on government has gone the way of the dodo bird.
It took a wedgie and a headlock to pin down a man suspected of breaking into a car. Yvonne Morris, a technician at the Brickyard Animal Hospital, said she chased a man who broke into a co-worker's car, but he kept squirming away from her. The third time, Morris grabbed hold of the man's boxer shorts and pulled. Salt Lake City police said she then she put a headlock on the man until help could arrive. The man was booked into the Salt Lake County jail on suspicion of vehicle burglary, possession of stolen property and outstanding warrants.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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Never tangle with a tech at an animal hospital.
#2
Neither, Gorb. Try irrelevant. The IAEA isn't going to do anything and has no teeth anyway. Every delay - of any kind - is a victory for the mullahs.
TNSM chief Sufi Muhammad said on Tuesday he would urge the Taliban to lay down their weapons. He told a gathering in Mingora he and his colleagues would continue their struggle until peace was restored in Malakand. The visit is part of the deal signed between a representative jirga of the TNSM and the NWFP government. A spokesman said the TNSM delegation would leave for Matta to talk with the Taliban on Wednesday. Sources said the delegation also met military officers and discussed the restoration of peace in Malakand.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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SURAT: A dry revolution is brewing in the villages of south Gujarat. Armed with lathis, a group of women is storming country-liquor breweries and destroying them. Since January, the women have destroyed over 100 liquor breweries in Surat district.
And this is not moral policing. Most of these 300-odd women have seen their alcoholic husbands die a painful death. They do not want more women to suffer similar fate.
In the first week of January, about 20 liquor breweries were destroyed in Mahuva taluka. Initially we organised talks to sensitise members in small groups. Once they were ready, we submitted memorandum requesting the police to clamp down on breweries, said Hemuben Patel, an Anganwadi worker in Samba village, who lost her husband three years ago following illness due to liquor consumption. But, when no action was taken, these women decided to act on their own.
We started attacking liquor breweries in large groups, she said.
It started with the group destroying 20 liquor breweries in the first week of January in villages of Mahuva taluka. Soon, around 2,000 women took out rallies and targeted liquor shops and thrashed bootleggers in Vehval village. The movement started to spread in other villages like Samba, Valvada, Tarkani, Umra, Vachhavad, Puna, Dhalkari and Kharvan.
The movement is still on in rural areas. It is a politically-motivated movement, said KS Bhati, superintendent of police, Surat.
Women, on the other hand blame the administration for going slow on bootleggers. Breweries have come up again at many places, says Sumitra Patel of Vehval village.
Posted by: john frum ||
02/18/2009
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Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers have stepped up conscription of child soldiers, the United Nations agency for children said on Tuesday, as the rebels prepare to face a final onslaught by the military.
"We have clear indications that the LTTE has intensified forcible recruitment of civilians and that children as young as 14 years old are now being targeted," Philippe Duamelle, UNICEF's chief in Sri Lanka, said. The Tigers, who are encircled in a small patch of jungle, have a long record of using child soldiers, and have recruited more than 6,000 since 2002 according to UNICEF. "With a growing number of children being recruited by the LTTE and scores of children being killed or injured in fighting, UNICEF today expressed its gravest concerns," the agency said.
The rebels did not immediately react to UNICEF's claims, though they did lash out after being accused on Monday of shooting civilians who try to escape the bloody conflict. The United Nations said "a growing number of people trying to leave have been shot and sometimes killed" as they sought safety by fleeing rebel territory to government-controlled areas. A front organisation for the Tigers countered those allegations by saying the UN had failed in its duty to protect innocent people.
The UN was "withdrawing even the remaining few local staff from the conflict zone (and) completely shedding its responsibility of caring for the civilians trapped here," said the Tamils Rehabilitation Organisation (TRO).
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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Feb. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Crude oil traded below $35 a barrel in New York on speculation that U.S. stockpiles climbed for the 19th time in 21 weeks amid a drop in demand because of the global economic contraction.
An Energy Department report tomorrow will probably show U.S. crude-oil inventories rose 3.2 million barrels last week, according to the median of 11 analyst responses in a Bloomberg News survey. The Reuters/Jefferies CRB Index of 19 commodities prices fell yesterday to 203.25, the lowest since June 21, 2002, and has slipped 11 percent this year.
Crude oil for March delivery was at $34.96 a barrel, up 3 cents, in electronic trading at 9:31 a.m. Singapore time on the New York Mercantile Exchange. In New York yesterday, futures fell $2.58, or 6.9 percent, to settle at $34.93 a barrel, the biggest decline since Jan. 27. Prices are down 22 percent this year.
The March contract expires on Feb. 20. The more active April contract was at $38.38 a barrel, down 16 cents, at 9:33 a.m. Singapore time.
Manufacturing in New York declined in February at the fastest pace on record, and Japans economy shrank in the fourth quarter at an annualized rate of 12.7 percent, the most severe contraction since 1974, government reports showed over the past two days.
Prices for oil to be delivered in future months are higher than for earlier ones, a situation known as contango, allowing buyers to profit from hoarding oil. The price of oil for delivery in April is $3.61 a barrel higher than for March. December futures are up $13.87 from the front month.
The build in supplies at Cushing, Oklahoma, where West Texas Intermediate, the U.S. benchmark grade, is stored, has contributed to the contango. Inventories there climbed 1.7 percent to 34.9 million barrels last week, the Energy Department said on Feb. 11. It was the highest since at least April 2004, when the department began keeping records for the location.
Gasoline stockpiles probably declined 300,000 barrels in the week ended Feb. 13, the survey showed. Supplies of distillate fuel, a category that includes heating oil and diesel, probably dropped 1.5 million barrels. Gasoline futures for March delivery were at $1.11 a gallon, down 18 cents, at 9:10 a.m. Singapore time. The contract yesterday fell 9.45 cents, or 7.8 percent, to $1.1118 a gallon yesterday in New York, the lowest settlement since Jan. 27
Brent crude oil for April settlement was at $40.55 a barrel, up 20 cents, at 9:22 a.m. Singapore time on Londons ICE Futures Europe exchange. It declined yesterday $2.25, or 5.2 percent, to end the session at $41.03 a barrel, the lowest since Dec. 30.
Brent crude is a better marker than West Texas, according to recent reports, since the latter can't be pumped to all the refineries in our country.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009
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Required cranky comment on price of gasoline not matching exactly the price of oil. I blame big oil gauging the little guy.
#2
What was REALLY weird was a couple months ago when (wholesale, pretax) gasoline was sold for LESS than the cost of the crude it was made from!
I know, I know: The refineries were making heating oil, with some gasoline as a byproduct. More than the market needed. But still, it was WEIRD. Things are getting back to normal now.
Posted by: Minister of funny walks ||
02/18/2009 8:15
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Yes and no. WTI spot price is $34.93 - $2.58, yet Brent spot is $40.93 + $1.72. It says there is an oversupply of Texas oil, but that doesn't determine the supply or price on the east and west coast consuming hubs where most of the oil is imported or from Alaska. As Steve said, Brent is a better benchmark. WTI is for the commodity options traders.
Posted by: ed ||
02/18/2009 8:38
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The whole oil-gas price thingee sounds a lot like a stacked deck con game--tell the people (us) anything you think they will accept as the truth. Not exactly another Ponzi scheme but similar. The current story is that we get oil from the North Sea and other places where oil is $10/barrel higher and therefore gasoline is higher. No matter that inventories here are bulging. So much for supply and demand theory--just a theory.
#5
In a perfectly efficient market, JohnQC, you might have a point. Unfortunately there's a whole lot that goes into business that gets in the way. WTI has maxed its storage cause you can't move it to where it might be efficiently used so, the demand for it goes down as does the price.
We can't build pipelines fast enough to send WTI to the coasts cause the expense is huge and the risk that the situation would change quickly way too high. So, Brent is in more demand and hence has a higher price.
#6
The bench mark price is West Texas Intermediate which is only a pittance of the crude used in refined product like gasoline. Most of our gasoline production is dependent on imported oil which has a higher bench mark plus transportation. That is the primary reason gas prices remain static or increase while WTI goes lower.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
02/18/2009 10:23
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Heh heh... and ummm.... gasoline has a seperate market from oil.... :)
The head of the city's police union today called for a municipal court judge to be dismissed after the judge ordered two pictures of John Pawlowski, the 25-year-old police officer killed Friday, be removed from his courtroom. In early afternoon, Municipal Court Judge Craig M. Washington sought to have the pictures of Pawlowski taken off his courtroom bench in the 35th District police station. District official denied that order, and Washington stepped down from the bench and placed both pictures face down on the table where they stood.
At a hastily called press conference about 90 minutes later, Fraternal Order of Police President John J. McNesby demanded that Washinton be removed from the judicial hearing list at the station pending an investigation. He also urged that all court hearings be suspended in the 35th District until an investigation is completed. Washington could not be reached for comment.
Through a spokesperson, President Judge Marsha Neifield said afterward that Washington would not be in the 35th District for the rest of the week, but that municipal court hearings in the district would not be suspended. "We have to take a deep breath and review the situation....It's too early to know if he will be back," said the spokesperson, Jeff Jubelirer.
In a prepared statement, Neifield said: "All of us are deeply saddened about the tragic loss of Officer Pawlowski. Our thoughts and prayers are foremost with Officer Pawlowski's family, friends and his police colleagues. We understand why emotions are running high."
A career criminal, Rasheed Scruggs, 33, has been charged with murder in the slaying of Pawlowski, who was shot when he intervened in an argument between Scruggs and a hack cab driver.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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Extremists pose a direct security threat to Pakistan and the US, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Tuesday, and vowed to push for more 'balance and harmony' in conducting US foreign policy.
A day after Pakistan struck a deal to implement sharia in Swat, Hillary told reporters in Tokyo that her country was studying the agreement Islamabad had reached with the Taliban and trying to understand the Pakistani government's 'intention and the actual agreed-upon language'. "Activity by the extremist elements in Pakistan poses a direct threat to the government of Pakistan as well as to the security of the US, Afghanistan and a number of other nations [beyond the] ... immediate region," said Hillary.
US President Barack Obama is pressing Pakistan to root out the Taliban, and recently sent envoy Richard Holbrooke to the region to review US strategy in the war on terror.
Alluding to the preceding Bush administration's stress on military power, Hillary told a gathering at the US embassy in Tokyo that President Barack Obama's administration sought to balance defence, diplomacy and development. "We do talk about the three Ds ... defence, diplomacy, development," said Hillary, on her first trip abroad as the chief US diplomat. "We happen to think they go together. If one gets out of proportion to the others, our policies and our role in the world gets a little out of balance," said the US secretary of state.
"I was talking to the head priest who told me about the importance of balance and harmony," she said after a visit early on Tuesday to a Shinto shrine. "We need to be looking to create more balance, more harmony. We are going to be reaching out to friends and allies," she said.
State Department:
Spokesman Gordon K Duguid said, "As I understand, Islamic law is within the constitutional framework of Pakistan, so I don't know that is particularly an issue for anyone outside of Pakistan to discuss."
Meanwhile, the US Statement Department on Tuesday reacted cautiously to the Swat agreement, saying it was in contact with the Pakistani government to know about the details of the strategy. "We are in touch with the government in Pakistan, we are discussing the issue, but that is all I have for you at the moment," said a State Department spokesman.
Spokesman Gordon K Duguid said, "As I understand, Islamic law is within the constitutional framework of Pakistan, so I don't know that is particularly an issue for anyone outside of Pakistan to discuss."
Pressed if Washington saw the agreement as a good or bad development, he said, "We have seen these sorts of actions before, what is important is that we are all working together to fight terrorism."
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#1
Oh, fer gawd sake. There isn't a Clue-Bat big enough for these fools.
#5
It sounds to me like the new Secretary of State is politely announcing that this latest move of the Pakistani government is so dumb as to be outright stupid. Were it a good idea, the US government wouldn't have to work at all to understand intentions. I'm sure the subtle Pakistanis understand her statement very clearly, without any study at all.
South Korea has termed North Korea a ''direct and serious threat'' in its Defense White Paper for 2008 to be issued Friday, Yonhap News Agency reported Tuesday. In its Defense White Paper for 2006, South Korea used the term of an ''existing'' North Korean military threat, Yonhap said.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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cluebat in use now that we are pulling back from Korea?
General David Petraeus, the head of the U.S. military's Central Command, has arrived in Uzbekistan for talks on new supply routes for U.S. troops in Afghanistan and other security issues, the U.S. Embassy there said.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) chief Yasin Malik's Pakistani fiance Mushaal Mullick, an artist based in London, loves painting nudes. The money from the art sales goes to social groups in Pakistan working for women and gender issues, say sources.
pictures at link
Her inspiration stems from the "raw beauty of the feminine mystique" and the "horrors of abject poverty", according to her web postings.
Malik, 39, who will get married to the London School of Economics (LSE) student early next year, is in custody at Sumbal, north Kashmir. He got engaged to Mushaal last week in absentia.
Mushaal has done her post-graduation in political economy from the LSE and is the daughter of Hussain Mullick, former chairman of the economics department at Islamabad's Quaid-e-Azam University.
Posted by: john frum ||
02/18/2009
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She sounds like a good bet for honor killing to me. If not by Malik then by a relative.
(AKI) - Yemeni police have arrested seven Saudi citizens allegedly linked to a local Al-Qaeda cell. According to the Saudi daily, Al-Watan, the seven were suspected of planning attacks against local oil fields and tourist spots in the Arab country.
The terrorists are reported to have admitted being part of the Al-Qaeda cell recently formed by Yemeni Naser al-Wahshi, who is said to have recruited several former detainees released from the US military prison in Guantanamo Bay.
The arrests took place in the past few days in a series of raids carried out by security forces in the region bordering Saudi Arabia.
Since news broke last month about the creation of a new Al-Qaeda cell on the Arabian Peninsula, Yemeni police have arrested 23 people allegedly linked to the terror group and accused of entering Yemen illegally to join the cell.
Yemeni foreign minister Abu Bakr al-Qirbi said last week that Al-Qaeda was under control in Yemen.
Speaking to the Saudi al-Madina newspaper, al-Qirbi said that the Yemeni and Saudi authorities had information on the whereabouts of militants in Saudi Arabia and Yemen.
"They are under security control and censorship," he said.
"Al-Qaeda elements do not provide anything other than violence, destruction and damage to their homeland and to Islam and Muslims."
He said that his country was currently preparing a centre for the rehabilitation of former Guantanamo detainees.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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The State Department said Tuesday the complete dismantling of North Korea's nuclear program remains the goal of the Chinese-led six-party negotiations with Pyongyang. The comment followed an assertion by a leading U.S. academic that North Korea appears determined to retain a small arsenal of nuclear weapons.
The State Department says while the Obama administration is reviewing all aspects of U.S. policy toward North Korea, it has not changed the ultimate objective of achieving a nuclear free Korean Peninsula.
The comments here came in response to a published assertion by U.S. Asia scholar Selig Harrison that North Korea appears adamant in holding on to the small arsenal of nuclear weapons it is understood to have produced in recent years, and is unlikely to be willing to negotiate anything other than a cap on its weapons holdings.
Harrison, a former Washington Post Asia correspondent and now a scholar with the Washington-based Center for International Policy, said in a Washington Post column Tuesday that he visited North Korea last month and found a hardening of policy there - apparently related to the reported illness of the country's leader, Kim Jong Il.
And to the fact that they're barking mad ...
Harrison said he was told by North Korean officials the communist state was ready to rule out building additional weapons, but that relinquishing already-weaponized nuclear material would depend on how Pyongyang's relationship with Washington evolved - a seeming roll-back from its 2005 agreement-in-principle to disarm in return for various benefits.
Because they think they can bamboozle Bambi ...
At a news briefing, State Department Deputy Spokesman Gordon Duguid said the desired "end state" of the six-party negotiations continues to be a nuclear-free Korea. "Any move to change the six-party process, or not to live up to the commitments to the six-party talks, of course would be of concern," he said. "However, the North Koreans have agreed, have made commitments to the international community and particularly to the members of the six-party talks, to carry our certain functions, certain activities that will provide the actions-for-action moves that we will take. So they should focus on those commitments that they have made rather than statements that are not particularly helpful."
The nuclear talks have been a key issue in Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's visit to Japan, which ends Wednesday. She has said in Tokyo the United States expects North Korea to fulfill its obligations, and that reported plans by Pyongyang to test a long-range missile would be "very unhelpful."
Asia scholar Harrison said in his commentary Tuesday that the hard-line stance he encountered in Pyongyang suggests the United States might have to accept the idea of a nuclear North Korea and formulate policy accordingly.
A senior official here said while Harrison is a private citizen, North Korea has played him for a fool used him as a sympstooge conduit for relaying official views before and that he expects him to be in touch with State Department officials on his latest trip.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009
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#2
Ok, let's call Kimmie's bluff. He can keep his four or five semi-operational nuclear weapons. In exchange, we will give South Korea a dozen nuclear-armed Tomahawks and the related launch and ground-support equipment. That way, both sides have a semi-equal nuclear status. I'm sure that within six weeks of our making the deal, the South will have found a way to secure those missiles in blast-proof shelters, giving themselves a retaliatory capability. Kimmie, of course, will need a bath and several changes of clothes.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
02/18/2009 11:53
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What will China think about S Korea having nukes?
After six years of silence, Dr Muhammad Amjad Khan, ex-husband of Dr Aafia Siddiqui, has finally spoken up and says that most of the press reports that relate to his former wife as well as his children are false. In an exclusive talk with The News, he said that most claims are being propagated to garner public support and sympathy for Dr Aafia but are one-sided and in most instances untrue. "That woman's crazy!"
Dr Aafia Siddiqui, suspected of having links to terrorist organizations, has been charged in a criminal complaint filed in a court of New York on account of attempting to kill US personnel during interrogation and on a charge of assaulting US officers and employees in Kabul, Afghanistan, on July 17, 2008. Subsequently Dr Aafia was imprisoned in Bagram for 18 days before being taken to the US for a trial.
Due to pressure from Aafia Siddiqui's family, the Pakistan government has been trying to secure her release from the US claiming her to be innocent. Although the US government has guaranteed Aafia the best legal assistance and a fair trial, her family is adamant that she be sent back on grounds that the US authorities have been consistently torturing her for years.
"Aafia's release cannot be secured by propagating stories based on falsehood and deception," commented Dr Amjad Khan, in an interview with The News. Dr Amjad, who was married to Dr Aafia for seven years until their divorce in October 2002, said Aafia's family and supporters should not believe that truth will not be revealed and mere lies will help in securing Aafia's repatriation.
He added that he is disappointed with the government's disregard for the law when officials handed over his eldest son, Ahmad, to his aunt Dr Fowzia Siddiqui on his return from Afghanistan last year instead of his legal guardian, his father. "The government made no effort to locate me despite the fact that I am Ahmad's real and legal guardian. My address in Karachi has not changed for the past 30 years. Ever since I returned from the US after our divorce, I have been living with my family," he said adding: "Both the Minister for Interior Rehman Malik and Dr Fowzia have been taking credit for obtaining Ahmad's release even though there was not a stone I left unturned to locate my missing children and obtain their custody according to law."
Providing documentary proof of the legal agreement between him and Dr Aafia following their divorce, Dr Amjad said that he had been financially supporting his three children Ahmed, Marium and Suleiman until the family stopped accepting the cheques he had been mailing. "After the agreement they accepted my cheques till March 2003. After that my cheques were being returned from Aafia's home and that got me worried. Soon after I learnt that in April 2003, Aafia and our children had been 'picked up' by agencies." Meanwhile, he received disturbing reports from the family that Aafia chose to leave Karachi with her children as she feared an attack from him.
Curious to locate the whereabouts of his children, Dr Amjad sought the help of the police and government officials to find them. "I was aware of Aafia's violent personality and extremist views and suspected her involvement in Jihadi activities. My fear later proved to be true when during Uzair Paracha's trial in the US in 2004, the real purpose of Aafia's trip to the US (between December 23, 2002 and January 3, 2003) was revealed."
Elaborating, Dr Amjad disclosed that he later learnt from media reports that Aafia's family claimed she made this trip to the US for job interviews in December at a time when universities were closed for winter holidays. "I also found it very odd that on the one hand Aafia insisted on leaving the US after September 11, 2001, claiming the country was unsafe for us and our children because the US government was abducting Muslim children, and on the other hand took the risk of travelling to that country again without fearing that she may be captured and may never see our children again."
While Dr Aafia was in the US, the authorities had been closely watching her, added Amjad. They soon issued the first global "wanted for questioning" alert for the couple in March 2003. "At that time, the agencies did not know we were divorced and I was also unaware of Aafia's involvement with two other terror suspects, Majid Khan and Ammar Al-Baluchi. They wanted me to persuade Aafia to appear for the interview with them and clear the charges leveled against her just as I had done. That is when she went underground and it later became apparent why she chose to 'disappear'," disclosed Dr Amjad.
Sharing details of his unsuccessful marriage with Dr Aafia, Dr Amjad told The News that since their marriage was arranged, he was unaware of Aafia's violent behaviour. "She got hysterical fits when she became angry and would physically attack me, but I put up with it for the sake of our children."
Although Amjad and Aafia both were inclined towards religion, he found her opinion towards Jihad to be of an extreme nature that sometimes made him uncomfortable. He became particularly suspicious of his wife's intentions when soon after the 9/11 attacks, she compelled Amjad to leave Boston (where Amjad was completing his residency) and move to Afghanistan where she claimed "he would be more useful".
The couple, however, chose to come to Pakistan instead for a vacation and discuss the matter with Amjad's family. It was here that his parents noticed Aafia's violent behaviour towards their son on several occasions, particularly when she openly asked for khula (divorce) when Amjad declined to go to Afghanistan. Therefore Amjad decided to file for a divorce as Aafia was adamant she wanted to go. "I tried my best to save our marriage, but divorce was inevitable," he recalls.
However, after mutual consent, the couple signed a legal agreement whereby the custody of the three minors was given to Aafia, while Amjad was required to pay for their education and maintenance. "Although the agreement says I am permitted to meet my children once a week, I was not allowed to do so," claimed Amjad sharing a copy of the agreement during the interview.
This article starring:
Aafia Siddiqui
al-Qaeda
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#1
"I was aware of Aafia's violent personality and extremist views and suspected her involvement in Jihadi activities. My fear later proved to be true when during Uzair Paracha's trial in the US in 2004, the real purpose of Aafia's trip to the US (between December 23, 2002 and January 3, 2003) was revealed."
Sharing details of his unsuccessful marriage with Dr Aafia, Dr Amjad told The News that since their marriage was arranged, he was unaware of Aafia's violent behaviour. "She got hysterical fits when she became angry and would physically attack me, but I put up with it for the sake of our children."
Picked right up on that, didn't they? What tipped ya off, Muldoon?
Well, Sarge, she's a Muslim and she's got no head... Come Muldoon, didn't you receive your mandatory sensitivity training?
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#1
I'm not sure what coverage this is getting in the US, but here in the UAE it is being reported by CNN hourly.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
02/18/2009 1:39
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#2
What does CNN International think about this, 49 Pan?
#4
Chesler called on U.S. and Canadian immigration authorities to inform potential Muslim immigrants and new Muslim citizens that it's illegal to abuse women in the two countries.
Oh yeah Muzzammil one last thing before we approve your visa, we need you to read this here pamphlet on domestic abuse. Long story short, you cant be slapping around the wife and kiddies anymore. And you may want to pay special attention to the section on Acid baths and Beheadings. Ok then sign here
#5
The report is straight forward reporting. It said she had a protection order against him and they had family voinence issues. A second report focused on how difficult it is for Muslim women to divorce. It said the idea for the TV station "Bridge" was her idea. It's reported as a murder.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
02/18/2009 9:59
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#6
Muzzammil is another Muslim that misinterpreted what he learned at the mosque.
#7
I'm not clear on all the details, he's what I've gathered....so he's at home yelling at his wife who's on the phone with her sister, telling him to calm down and then he chokes and beheads her and brings her corpse to the Bridges offices and displays her body in a ritual way? Anyone else have the details?
Posted by: Omolugum Prince of the Platypi2692 ||
02/18/2009 11:04
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#8
Well, at least he's reclaimed his honor now. /sarc
#9
"Honor killing", like "ethnic cleansing", is a repulsive euphemism. We should not let our enemies provide our vocabulary to describe their monstrous acts.
#10
I notice a significant absence of 'Honor Suicide' over these types of issues. I guess seppuku by the family patriarch hasn't really caught on in their culture.
#15
The husband, Muzzammil, is still maintaining he didn't do it as of late yesterday.
Oddly enough, it seems that when he wandered into the Orchard Park police station to report his wife's death, he admitted to killing her. Insisting now that he's innocent is not likely to convince a jury in Orchard Park, although it might have in Lackawanna.
Thanks for the report, 49 Pan.
Omolugum Prince of the Platypi2692, where did you read/see that?
The government of Pakistan would pursue the persons allegedly involved in the Mumbai attacks in court after getting replies to the questions raised in the Federal Investigation Agency's report, Minister of State for Interior Tasneem Ahmed Qureshi said on Tuesday.
While talking to reporters at a ceremony held at a local school, he said the probe into the Mumbai attacks was in progress and nothing had been concluded yet. India would have to cooperate for an effective investigation and conclusion. The government was serious in bringing the culprits to justice, he added. While talking about the Nizam-e-Adl agreement, he called it a positive development to ensure peace in the conflict area and the federal government would extend all its support to the provincial government to bring peace in the region. He stressed dialogue was the only solution to all the conflicts and problems.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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Former Ald. Arenda Troutman was sentenced to four years in prison today for mail and tax fraud. Troutman admitted that for several years she had solicited cash from developers to back their projects in her South Side ward. The sentence was handed down after Troutman tearfully told the judge that she's not "a monster" as portrayed by prosecutors who said she accepted bribes and fraternized with gang members. Nope. She's just a Chicago alderman...
She asked for leniency so she could remain with her three sons. "This society is real cruel to young black boys who don't have instruction and guidance," she said. "They'll get swallowed up in the belly of the beast." And what instruction and guidance would you offer them, Arenda? Don't get caught?
U.S. District Judge Ruben Castillo said he believed that Troutman is a good mother to her sons and a good daughter to her ailing mother but described her as "a walking contradiction." He noted that Troutman had once worked with the late Chicago Mayor Harold Washington but wouldn't be joining him in the local political Hall of Fame. "Instead you join the Hall of Shame of politicians who sold their offices," Castillo said.
"Even by Chicago standards, it's no small crime," Alesia said.
Assistant U.S. Atty. Joseph Alesia called Troutman's conduct "a five-year crime spree." In some instances she blocked low-income housing because no one involved would pay her a bribe, he said. "Even by Chicago standards, it's no small crime," Alesia said.
Troutman's lawyer, Michael Gillespie, said she accepted full responsibility. "She is terribly humbled and saddened by what she has done to constituents in her ward," he said. Not enough to do her time quietly ...
The former alderwoman had about 30 supporters in the courtroom. Moments after the judge handed down the prison sentence, Troutman was seated at defense table with supporters huddled around her in what appeared to be a prayer circle. She remained free on bail pending appeal.
After she was charged with corruption in early 2007, Troutman, the alderman of the 20th Ward, defiantly denied wrongdoing and suggested she had been targeted for political reasons. "Folk in my community understand there can be false allegations when there is someone who is the voice of the people," Troutman told the Tribune at the time. But in August a subdued Troutman admitted that prosecutors had been right after all and that for several years she had solicited cash from developers to back projects in her ward.
Troutman is the 12th Chicago alderman convicted of wrongdoing in the last 20 years, but the first since Percy Giles (37th) in 1999.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#1
she blocked low-income housing because no one involved would pay her a bribe
Sounds more like a typical heartless Chinese official...thanks for bringing that into America, Troutman.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Il issued Tuesday an open letter to the public, thanking it for nominating him as candidate to deputy in all constituencies for the upcoming parliament poll, official media reported early Wednesday. Kim said in the letter that he will be standing from the Supreme People's Assembly's constituency no. 333 at the election on March 8, the Korean Central News Agency reported.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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Whew! I was worried he might not get enough signatures on his petition.
Just a day after its boycott of the peace jirga, the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) announced its 'unconditional' support for the pact reached between the NWFP government and Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (TNSM) for restoration of peace in Malakand division.
The decision was taken during the Shura (consultative body) meeting of JI chaired by the party's provincial chief Sirajul Haq here on Tuesday. The meeting also decided to observe 'Peace Day' today (Wednesday) in Malakand division.
"We welcome the agreement. We also appreciate the Taliban ceasefire. But at the same time, we urge the government to take practical steps for implementation of Islamic system," Sirajul Haq told journalists after chairing the Shura meeting.
He said the JI believes solution to all problems lies in the implementation of Islamic system, enforcement of which was the longstanding demand of the people of Malakand.
He suggested the government should do away with interest-based system of banking besides introducing the Islamic system of justice. The JI leader also demanded payment of compensation to families of those killed and those injured in the fighting.
The government should also make prompt arrangements for the return and rehabilitation of the internally displaced families to their homes in different areas of Swat, he added.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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Speaker Abdul Hamid in a ruling yesterday said the government must implement the resolution on holding trial of the war criminals, which was unanimously adopted by the House calling the executive to hold the trial.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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President Asif Ali Zardari on Tuesday reiterated the commitment of his party and the government to preserve, protect and strengthen democracy. Even while giving away significant chunks of the country...
In a message on the eve of Feb 18 in commemoration of the day (Day of Democracy) when elections were held last year, the president said: "Let us vow not to let anyone usurp the rights of the people, not to let dictatorship strike again." "... unles it's wearing a turban."
He said this required rededication to the principles of parliamentary democracy, constitutionalism and the rule of law. "We all must join hands to make parliament - the embodiment of the will of the people -- truly strong and supreme," he added.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#1
Wouldn't it have to exist first before he could strengthen it?
Pakistan was serious about the investigations into Mumbai attacks, former foreign minister Khurshid Mahmood Kasuri said on Tuesday. They just don't act serious.
The foreign minister told reporters on the sidelines of a book release in Indian capital New Delhi. "Though I am in the opposition but I believe government of Pakistan is very serious. I am among those who, in case of community issues, rise above party lines. I have worked very hard for the peace between Pakistan and India and I hope during my three or four day stay here I can take this process forward even as a ordinary citizen when I don't hold an office," said Kasuri.
He said there was progress in the investigation and promised to do his best to foster peace between the neighbours. "I think the government of Pakistan is working and cooperating," Kasuri said, adding that people in both the nations wanted peace to prevail. "Ninety-nine percent of common man on both sides of the border want peace but extremists are there in both India and Pakistan."
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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NEW DELHI: The Army was more busy fighting militancy in North-East rather than Jammu and Kashmir last year if the number of militants "successfully eliminated'' is taken into account.
While the Army "killed'' 330 terrorists and apprehended 172 others in J&K in 2008, it "neutralised'' 717 United Liberation Front of Asom militants in Assam.
Moreover, relentless operations by Army and Assam Rifles in Manipur led to 209 militants of various outfits being killed, and another 863 being apprehended, during the year.
A "brief statement'' on "activities and achievements'' of the defence ministry released on Tuesday holds that the Army's counter-insurgency operations in J&K successfully targeted the terrorist leadership, eliminating 60 "middle-level'' leaders during the year.
"Freedom of action and therefore the ability of terrorists to carry out sensational acts of violence has been severely circumscribed, manifesting in lower violence levels,'' it said.
Posted by: john frum ||
02/18/2009
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Extension of the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation to the entire Malakand division does not mean the imposition of a Taliban-style regime, Awami National Party leader Afrasiyab Khattak has said. Khattak told a private TV channel on Tuesday that the regulation was a judicial system aimed at the provision of speedy justice to the people. He said the regulation had been operational in Malakand since 1994. "It was revised in 1999 and now we will revise it again in 2009," he added. He said the judiciary in Malakand was part of the regular judiciary of the country.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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For people caught inside Mexico's drug corridors, life is about keeping your head down and watching your back, especially when the sun dips behind the cactus-studded horizon.
No town knows this better than Villa Ahumada, where the entire police force quit after 70 cartel hit men roared through last spring, killing the police chief, two officers and three townspeople.
Residents were left defenseless again last week when gunmen returned and kidnapped nine people, despite the soldiers manning checkpoints far outside town.
"This was a mellow town where we would walk along main street at night. But now we're too scared to even go out," said Zaida de Santiago.
For this lanky 14-year-old, everything changed last May 17. She was dancing at a neighbor's ranch when gunfire shattered the night. The party's hosts turned off the lights and silenced the music. The guests stood frozen, ears trained to the sound of automatic weapons as the gunmen raced down gravel streets in their SUVs.
When the sun rose hours later, the party guests learned that armed cartel commandos had killed the police chief and five others. Soon after, the rest of the 20-member force quit in fear. "That day will always remain burned in my mind," Santiago said.
Federal investigators say Villa Ahumada is a key stop along one of Mexico's busiest drug smuggling routes, where the Sinaloa cartel has been challenging the Juarez gang for control. The military staffs checkpoints miles outside town, and soldiers and federal police roll through each day, but residents are largely left on their own.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#1
the military checkpoints are more to shakedown money from tourists
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/18/2009 7:18
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Armed Populace.
Its a shame Mexico has draconian laws that keep firearms out of the hand of ordinary people, but criminals get military armament.
#3
This is no different from the good old days, with bandito bands roaming around. The PRI party ruled Mexico from the 1920s to the 1990s, by keeping a handle on this nonsense, and they will probably come back because of this.
Whether or not this is before or after a bloody civil war remains to be seen.
#4
OS, We sort of have the Second Amendment in the U.S. Depends upon what state you live in. Laws regulating CC is a patchwork quilt of differing laws--anything from effectively preventing CC to fewer restrictions. The 2nd Amend. seems to be a thing to be circumvented by the liberals (read socialists). It is an unpleasant nuisance to be gotten around for people like Diane Feinstein, Charles Schumer, Dick Durbin, Bobby Rush, BO, etc.
#5
The Magnificent Seven could not be reached for comment.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
02/18/2009 13:25
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Let me give you the latest wrinkle on the 2nd amendment assault in California. Most of the counties have very restrictive or non-existant Concealed Carry permit rules (CCW). Some of the more rural counties in the interior central valley had reasonable systems. Soooooo anti-gun attorneys have determined that by suing a just retired Sheriff for personal liability claiming he handed out permits as political favors and thereby was outside the scope of his duties, they can have a chilling effect on all of the Chiefs and Sheriff's ststewide. After 16 years of continuous licensing, my own county sheriff has just lawyered up and made the process virtually impossible. In specific, citing "personal protection" was no longer deemed sufficient justification for a permit. It must have a documented threat nexus of be work related. Issuance of permits in that county have fallen by over 90%.
Personal liability trumps reasonable conformity to the 2nd amendment. Welcome to the future my friends....
Posted by: Thaing Dark Lord of the Pixies1544 ||
02/18/2009 15:27
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#7
As Shakespeare said, "First, we'll kill the lawyers". As the ACLU, expecially, continues to use the law as a bludgeon to beat others down, the rest of us get very, very angry. When that anger explodes, there will no longer be an ACLU, and there will be hundreds or thousands of judges needed to replace the old ones. It's no longer a matter of "if", only of "when".
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
02/18/2009 21:16
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At the top right hand corner of Page 17 of the New York Post of January 24th, 2009, was a short column entitled; "Replacing Michelle; in the National Review, The Week" column.
I found this interesting, so here it is, word for word, as it appeared two days ago......
"Some employees are simply irreplaceable. Take Michelle Obama: The University of Chicago Medical center hired her in 2002 to run "programs for community relations, neighborhood outreach, volunteer recruitment, staff diversity and minority contracting."
In 2005 the hospital raised her salary from $120,000 to $317,000 - nearly twice what her husband made as a Senator.
Way to network Michelle!
Oh did we mention that her husband had just become a US Senator? He sure had. Requested a $1 Million earmark for the UC Medical Center, in fact.
But now that Mrs Obama has resigned, the hospital says her position will remain unfilled. How can that be, if the work she did was vital enough to be worth $317,000? Cuz it made them about 700 grand in Uncle Sugar's money...
#3
Try graduating from Princeton and getting a Harvard law degree and see whether being paid $120,000.00 while others in comparable positions (Vice Presidents) at U.C. Hospital earn $500,000. Look at salaries people earn on Wall Street with far less education than she who earn millions. I would say she was being underpaid. As for the then senator requesting $1M for U.C. Hospital. The person forgot to mention that he requested several other earmarks which he made public. And did I mention that he was elected by the people of Illinois where the hospital is "unfortunately" located serving communities that depend on it for service while 45 million Americans are without health care? And by the way, has anyone asked how many top positions have been declared redundant at UCH due to the economic downturn?
Posted by: John Grant ||
02/18/2009 9:26
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#4
Sure. And Michael told me that in five years the Corleones would be completely legitimate.
Who's being naive now, John?
Posted by: Kay Corleone ||
02/18/2009 9:52
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#5
Next time you see a Princeton or Harvard grad down an out on the street, be sure to slip them at least a $100 bill. Anything less is beneath them.
Posted by: ed ||
02/18/2009 10:04
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Mr John Grant
You seem to imply that graduating from Harvard entitles automatically you to a 500K job
The older I grow and the more I tend to look at any university degree who doesn't require a healthy dose of maths as mere crap who entitles you to a job at McDonald's unless you can demonstrate on the ground that you are good for something.
I forgot to mention that thanks to affirmative action we don't know if Mrs O went to Harvard because she was good or because her skin was the right color.
#7
Don't mention to John she Michelle got into Princeton via Affirmitive Action. Please save your outrage for the person who deserved to go to Princeton but was pushed out to make way for someone simply because of their RACE. (which is, BTW, the definition of Racism).
According to her own staffers, she did not have the grades to go to Harvard or Princeton (or any other Ivy League) but, because of the pigmentation of her skin, was able to push someone else (who probably worked damn hard for the chance) out.
Nobody knows if Bambi himself benefitted from Affirmative Action - his records are sealed by his own demand.
#8
the hospital is "unfortunately" located serving communities that depend on it for service
Not really. The ER at UC hospital has begun to reject people who can't pay. The other day a black kid who was mauled by a dog was turned away. Neighborhood concerns mount after U. of C. unveils plan to redirect some patients
Hope and change!
#9
Her degrees give her a rather dubious honor of being among the curdled cream of the crop:
JPMorgan Chase
James L. Dimon, CEO and Chairman: Harvard Business School (1982), Tufts University (1978)
Barry L. Zubrow, Executive VP: University of Chicago Law School (1980), University of Chicago Business School (1979), Haverford College (1975)
Frank Bisignano, CAO: Newport University
Citigroup
Vikram Pandit, CEO: Columbia Business School (1986); Columbia University MBA (1980), M.S. (1977), B.S. (1976)
Lewis Kaden, Vice-Chairman and CAO: Harvard Law School (1967), Harvard University (1963),
Stephen Volk, Vice-Chairman: Harvard Law School (1960), Dartmouth College (1957)
John Havens: Harvard (1979)
Bank of America
Kenneth D. Lewis, Chairman, CEO and President: Executive Program at Stanford University, Mack Robinson College of Business at Georgia State University (1969)
Morgan Stanley
John Mack, Chairman and CEO: Duke University (1968)
Walid Chammah, Co-President: American Graduate School of International Management (1977), American University of Beirut (1976)
James P. Gorman, Co-President: MBA Columbia University (1987); BA, JD University of Melbourne
Wells Fargo
John Stumpf, President and CEO: MBA University of Minnesota, BA St. Cloud State University
Richard M. Kovacevich, Chairman: MBA Stanford University (1967), BA Stanford (1965)
Goldman Sachs
Lloyd Blankfein, Chairman and CEO: Harvard Law School (1978), Harvard University (1975)
Jon Winkelried, President and Co-COO: University of Chicago Booth School of Business (1982), University of Chicago (1981)
Gary Cohn, President and Co-COO: American University (1982)
Washington Mutual
Kerry Killinger, CEO: University of Iowa, MBA (1971), BBA (1970)
Alan Fishman, former CEO: Columbia University (1969), Brown University (1967)
Stephen Rotella, President/COO: State University of New York (1978)
IndyMac
Michael Perry, CEO: California State University, Sacramento
Scott Keys, CFO: Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles
Bear Stearns
Alan Schwartz, President and CEO: Duke (1972)
James Cayne, former CEO: attended Purdue
AIG
Edward Liddy, CEO: MBA from George Washington University (1972), Catholic University of America (1968)
Robert Willumstad, former CEO: attended Adelphi University
Lehman Brothers
Richard S. Fuld, Chairman: MBA from NYU Stern School of Business (1973), University of Colorado at Boulder (1969)
Herbert H. McDade, President and COO: MBA University of Michigan, BA Duke University
Ian T. Lowitt, CFO: BSc. and MSc. University of the Witwatersrand (Johannesburg), BA and MSc from Oxford
Merrill Lynch
John Thain, Chairman and CEO: Harvard Business School (1979), MIT (1977)
Peter Kraus, Executive VP: MBA from NYU (1975), Trinity College (1974)
Thomas Montag, Global Head of Sales: Stanford (1979)
Bernard Madoff
Hofstra College (1960)
GM: Richard Wagoner, CEO. Harvard Business School (1977), Duke University (1975)
Chrysler: Robert Nardelli, CEO. University of Louisville College of Business (1975), Western Illinois University in Macomb (1971)
Circuit City: Philip Schoonover, former CEO: University of New Hampshire (1978), Boston College; James Marcum, CEO: Southern Connecticut State University (1980)
Sprint: Dan Hesse, CEO: MA, MIT (1989); MBA, Cornell University (1977); University of Notre Dame (1975),
Charter Communications: Paul Allen, CEO. Attended Washington State University
Sirius/XM Radio: Mel Karmazin, CEO: Pace University (1967)
Midway Games: Sumner Redstone, Majority Owner: Harvard Law School (1947), Harvard University (1944); Shari Redstone, Chairman. Tufts (1975)
The final tab:
Harvard: 11
Columbia: 6
Chicago: 4
Duke: 4
Stanford: 4
American University: 2
MIT: 2
NYU: 2
Tufts: 2
University of Iowa: 2
#11
Try graduating from Princeton and getting a Harvard law degree
As JFM says, and Thealing Borgia 122 so thoroughly points out, getting degrees from expensive schools does not guarantee the holder is worth paying anything, let alone half a million dollars per annum including overhead and benefits.... although a decade ago the future Mrs. Obama certainly swanned about that Chicago law office as though she were ever so much more worthwhile than her law associate peers.
Finally, as JohnQC stated, because of her husband and his contacts, Mrs. Obama got the hospital more money than she cost, and so was worth the investment. The UC hospital is not likely to find another with all her attributes for a generation. Naturally they wouldn't fill that position with anyone less.
The Texas financier accused by the Securities and Exchange Commission Tuesday of "massive ongoing fraud" was a generous political donor who gave more heavily to Democrats. Since 2000, R. Allen Stanford, the chief of the Stanford Financial Group in Houston, his wife and company gave $2.2 million in political contributions -- $1.7 million to Democratic candidates and committees -- according to Federal Election Commission records.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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But the PGA Tour announced they are still going ahead with Stanford as sponsor of the St. Jude Classic in Memphis. Unbelievable.
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
02/18/2009 9:50
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OTTAWA (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said on Tuesday he still wants to reopen the North American Free Trade Agreement, despite a warning from Canada that this would be a mistake, but he said he did not want to end up curbing trade.
Isn't it great how Bambi is winning friends all around the world for us?
In an interview with the Canadian Broadcasting Corp, shortly before his visit to Ottawa on Thursday, Obama also declined to characterize oil from Canada's vast oil sands region as "dirty oil" which should somehow be curtailed.
Obama had alarmed Canada during the Democratic primaries last year when he advocated renegotiating NAFTA, and he reiterated this goal on Tuesday while recognizing these were sensitive economic times.
"As I've said before, NAFTA, the basic framework of the agreement, has environmental and labor protections as side agreements. My argument has always been that we might as well incorporate them into the full agreement so that they're fully enforceable," he said in the interview with CBC television.
However, he also said: "I think there are a lot of sensitivities right now because of the huge decline in world trade."
Obama noted there was $1.5 billion in trade between Canada and the United States every day, adding: "It is not in anybody's interest to see that trade diminish."
Gee, no kidding. Not to mention that the Canadians sell us a whole of oil that they could sell to someone else ...
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009
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A bigger worry is Canadian natural gas, which can't be replaced from other sources.
#3
President Barack Obama said on Tuesday he still wants to reopen the North American Free Trade Agreement, despite a warning from Canada that this would be a mistake
If NAFTA is such a good trade deal then why does Canada warn that it would be a mistake to reopen NAFTA. I have never thought these trade agreements were good--just Clintonian politics that gave away jobs. NAFTA is not free trade.
#4
He badly needs Japanese and Chinese Kissenger and Associates coordinated bond dollars in order to finance his bailout schemes. If they think for a moment he's going to shut down their offshore Walmart operations, he's doomed. No tickie, no ride. Their unemployed people come first. His "Made in America" slogans are only a ruse for the little people. He knows better, so does Rahm, Manderin speaking Giethner, Paulson and the other scoundrels.
- provide mortgage help to deal with the forclosure crisis
- purchase a new home
- start a new business or assist with an existing business
- pay off student loans or assist new students with obtaining a degree and giving government aid
- If there is a bill out there that needs to be paid there may be funding now available that will be able to cover it.
REST ASSURED! YOU WILL NOT HAVE TO PAY FOR ANYTHING! (Fine Print? ...but it will have to be paid for by all the generations that follow, "as these sins will be visited upon your children, even unto the 4th generation".)
Posted by: ed ||
02/18/2009 8:57
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I hear Bill Mays is making an informercial about this.
"Free money for just $19.95 but if you act now we will throw in a Tim Geithner bubble head doll as a bonus. So act now. Call 1-800-MyMoney and as for Barry".
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
02/18/2009 9:42
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The United States says Sunday's Venezuelan referendum ending term limits for elected officials took place in a "fully democratic" process. A U.S. State Department spokesman, Gordon Duguid, told reporters Tuesday there were some troubling reports of intimidation of opponents, but that for the most part, the electoral process was fully consistent with democratic practice.
Is Gordon a Carter appointee?
The spokesman said the U.S. will continue to seek a positive relationship with Venezuela and looks to the government to use its democratic results in a positive manner.
The referendum allows Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to seek re-election for a third term in 2012. It was his second bid to remove presidential term limits after voters rejected a similar proposal in 2007. Mr. Chavez says he needs more time to transform Venezuela into a socialist state. Critics say he is becoming a dictator.
More than 16 million people were eligible to cast ballots in Sunday's referendum. Election officials say the turnout was 67 percent, or 11 million. Official results show that 54 percent supported the measure, while some 46 percent rejected it. The opposition says the president's use of state funds made the campaign unfair.
Michelle Obama may finally be proud of her country but if people like Gordon are running the show I'm going to wretch ...
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009
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i.e. "Yup the people of Venezuela ARE that stupid"
#3
i.e. "Yup the people of Venezuela ARE that stupid"
Y'all don't really believe that the announced vote counts reflect actual ballots placed in the ballot boxes? It's Chavez's people who are counting the votes, not some mythical, balanced, honest, publicly observed tally. The people of Venezuela may be that stupid, but we -- and they -- will never know.
#8
TW, I do believe that the result could be legit.
The people there, jsut enough of them, are on the Chavez "gravy train" and have been taught raered to believe that "the government" will give them everything they need, once it takes it from all those nasty rich capitalists who "stole" it from "the people".
Combine that wiht the sycophants and others who benefit directly, and Venezuela may have hit a tipping point, from which they voted themselves into the abyss.
Look at the US and the Obama voters who fooled themselves for an example of stupid people tilting an election.
#11
Venezuela has been a mess for a very long time, typical of a country addicted to the oil tit. Hugo is merely the current manifestation of their swirl around the toilet bowl. I am sure the vote is authentic. They really are that stupid.
U.S. Sen. Roland Burris now acknowledges attempting to raise money for ousted Gov. Rod Blagojevich - an explosive twist in his ever-changing story on how he landed a coveted Senate appointment from the man accused of trying to sell the seat.
Look surprised now. C'mon, you can do it.
This is Chicago. We'll learn tomorrow that he offered up a family member ...
Burris made the admission to reporters on Monday, after releasing an affidavit over the weekend saying he had more contact with Blagojevich aides about the Senate seat than he had described under oath to the state House panel that recommended Blagojevich's impeachment. The Democrat also said in the affidavit, but not before the panel, that the governor's brother asked him for fundraising help.
Though Burris insists he never raised money for Blagojevich while the governor was considering whom to appoint to the seat President Barack Obama vacated, the revelation that he had attempted to do so is likely to increase calls for Burris' resignation and an investigation into whether he committed perjury before the panel. Illinois Democrats have forwarded documents related to Burris' testimony to a county prosecutor for review.
Burris would not answer questions Tuesday in Peoria about his attempts to raise funds for Blagojevich, but said he didn't do anything wrong and encouraged officials to look into the matter.
"I welcome the opportunity to go before any and all investigative bodies, including those referred by Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan and the Senate ethics committee to answer any questions they have," he told reporters Tuesday.
Burris has never been known for his political acumen. He's basically a dummy who got where he got by being a good machine man. The Dhimmicrats have to be worried that he's going to get hammered in the 2010 election. His ties to Blago, his foot in mouth problem, and the fact that he's a scumbag Chicago pol will do him in unless the Pubs nominate a guy with sealed divorce records.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#1
He was always toast for 2010, Doc. He will face a primary challenger if he decides to run. The Trunks still have an uphill battle, but at least a realistic chance. Thanks Rod & Rol!
(Listen to Burris sometime. He's a dead ringer for the voice of Winnie the Pooh.)
#2
For your reading pleasure, here is the link for John Kass's column on the subject:
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-18-feb18,0,4327749.column
#4
I knew something was up with this scumbag because he was so impatient to get his senate seat while others were calling for caution and more information.
He never answers any questions, only statements like "I didn't do anything illegal"
Posted by: Omolugum Prince of the Platypi2692 ||
02/18/2009 10:43
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#5
At least he got to be the deciding vote for the Messiah's Porkulus bill before having to fall on the rotisserie spit.
The House Energy and Commerce Committee is also looking at how it can put in place policies that would allow it greater oversight of the Internet. "Internet radio is becoming a big deal, and we're seeing that some web sites are able to control traffic and information, while other sites that may be of interest or use to citizens get limited traffic because of the way the people search and look for information," says on committee staffer. "We're at very early stages on this, but the chairman has made it clear that oversight of the Internet is one of his top priorities."
We want to get alternative views on radio and TV, but we also want to makes sure those alternative views are read, heard and seen online, which is becoming increasingly video and audio driven.
"This isn't just about Limbaugh or a local radio host most of us haven't heard about," says Democrat committee member. "The FCC and state and local governments also have oversight over the Internet lines and the cable and telecom companies that operate them. We want to get alternative views on radio and TV, but we also want to makes sure those alternative views are read, heard and seen online, which is becoming increasingly video and audio driven. Thanks to the stimulus package, we've established that broadband networks -- the Internet -- are critical, national infrastructure. We think that gives us an opening to look at what runs over that critical infrastructure."
Also involved in "brainstorming" on "Fairness Doctrine and online monitoring has been the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank, which has published studies pressing for the Fairness Doctrine, as well as the radical MoveOn.org, which has been speaking to committee staff about policies that would allow them to use their five to six million person database to mobilize complaints against radio, TV or online entities they perceive to be limiting free speech or limiting opinion.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#1
Start with the Nigerian Spammers, Take down "Scareware" Companies and Clean the internet of Viruses and I'm all for it.
But what I expect is another form of "Nannyism" and expense added on to "Clean the web"
In other words a money theft bullshit program that does nothing and drains our wallets doing it.(For the Children, of course.)
Posted by: Rednek Jim ||
02/18/2009 0:55
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#7
"Thanks to the stimulus package, we've established that broadband networks -- the Internet -- are critical, national infrastructure. We think that gives us an opening to look at what runs over that critical infrastructure."
#26
The internet is media. It is critical to the success of almost any media component moving forward. That includes movies and TV shows. So this little putz is going to regulate/piss in the very pool that elects him term after term...Beverly Hills. What a jackass. But it is another indication that these idiots are going to overreach. They already are on the economy. They are going to do it on the lifestyle/political correctness/speech stifling side too. Then there will come a huge backlash. Can't wait.
Pakistan's religious scholars and Ulema have expressed reservations over the implementation of the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation 2009 in Malakand division, which was imposed after a deal was finalised between the NWFP government and Tehreek-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat Muhammadi (TNSM).
Pakistan Mufti-e-Azam and Ruhat-e-Hilal Committee Chairman Mufti Muneeb-ur-Rehman, while talking to Daily Times on Tuesday, said that the deal is a 'silent' agreement between two parties which is a step towards curbing the ongoing unrest. "Does the agreement justify the killing of innocent people and if so, who is to blame for the deaths? The second question that arises is that if the Shariat has been imposed by force then what about the other parts of the country?" asked Rehman. Replying to a question, Rehman said that even though he is Pakistan's Muft-e-Azam, his opinion was not sought in this regard. He demanded that President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani take all religious scholars of all sects into confidence before implementing the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation 2009.
Idara-e-Tabligh Taleemat-e-Islami Pakistan Head Allama Syed Aun Naqvi said that it is a political deal which has been done with Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan through Sufi Muhammad. Expressing his reservations, he said, "What about the people belonging to other sects in the Malakand division such as Birhalvi, Shia, Ismaili, Bohri to name a few?" He added that if the regulation is implemented in other areas of NWFP, the people will not be given justice, the impact of which will be seen throughout the country.
He also said that if this is the way that the situation will be dealt with, the people might hold protests throughout the country. He declared that the decisions in the Shia sect are taken in the light of the Quran, Sunnat and wit, adding that, "This decision was taken by consulting the Quran, Sunnat and Ijema, hence, the Shia community does not accept the agreement."
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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The Mumbai terror attacks could not have taken place without local support and there should be a 'thorough judicial inquiry' into the matter, Bharatiya Janata Party leader LK Advani said on Tuesday.
Indian Express quoted him as saying, "It is clear that planning happened for a year and they visited the places they attacked on November 26. It is not possible that there are no local links in 26/11. It is a well-planned conspiracy."
According to the newspaper, Advani questioned the basis on which the Mumbai police commissioner gave a "certificate denying any local involvement and stating that all those responsible for the carnage had been accounted for".
"The investigation is not yet complete. Yet a statement by the Mumbai police commissioner says that all those responsible for the carnage have been accounted for. That they are either dead or in custody. And there is no local link. How can they have given that certificate," the opposition leader was quoted by the paper as saying.
Indian Express reported that Advani pointed to the confessions of Rampur CRPF camp attack accused Fahim Ansari about the elaborate preparations for the Mumbai terror attack and said, "I demand a thorough judicial investigation into 26/11. The Rampur element and local support should be investigated."
It reported that Advani accused the government of failing to pre-empt the Mumbai terror attacks. He was quoted as saying, "The Mumbai attacks were unprecedented. We were not aware but the government had feelers that the next attack would be through the sea route."
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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At least four people were killed and 18 others injured on Tuesday when a powerful car bomb ripped through a street in Bazid Khel village on the outskirts of Peshawar, police and locals said.
The injured were rushed to Lady Reading Hospital and three are said to be in critical condition. An official at morgue said seven people had died in the blast but only three bodies were shifted to hospital. However, police have not confirmed the seven deaths. According to Reuters, five people were killed and 16 wounded in the attack.
Two cars: Eyewitnesses said suspected Taliban arrived in the village on two cars and parked in front of Bazid Khel Union Council Nazim Fahimur Rehman's home. Following this, they said, a powerful bomb blast occurred, damaging four houses, a dispensary and shops in addition to the deaths and injuries. The nazim was home at the time of the blast, but escaped injury.
Asif, a brother of the nazim, told Daily Times the two suspected Taliban who had arrived in the vehicles had been arrested. However, police did not confirm any arrest. Muhammad Afzal, a local, said he had also heard 15 gunshots after the blast. According to a Bomb Disposal Squad official, about 35 kilogrammes of explosives were packed in the cars and were detonated through remote control.
the bombing is believed to be retaliation for the villagers executing nine Taliban belonging to a banned group on February 4.
Armed and ready: Following the blast, armed villagers came out of their houses to prevent any further incursion into the village. According to sources, the bombing is believed to be retaliation for the villagers executing nine Taliban belonging to a banned group on February 4. The Taliban had been trying to kidnap Fahim. At the time, villagers had demanded the government take action against the Taliban operating from Bara tehsil of Khyber Agency. However, the government did not take any action.
President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani strongly condemned the bombing, saying the government was committed to ensuring its writ at all costs and would not bow down to extremists, militants and terrorists.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#3
Well that's the question isn't it, OS. One could argue that the F-35 is capable enough that we should buy more of them instead of the F-22. I'm not an aviator and have no idea in the end what the right policy is.
The article makes a great point: our military takes air supremacy as the starting point for a lot of what it wants to do. If we don't have that the ground-pounders are potentially in big trouble.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009 10:53
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#6
Grom, you are wrong. You show that you are a simpleton and an arrogant bigot, as is usually visible from you bilge filled posts. Piss off like the good little simpleton you are, Adults are talking here.
#8
And if you want a Lavi, go buy a Chinese J-10 Chengdu - the bastard Israelis sold the tech and design from the Lavi to the Chinese who built the J-10 off of it (Jerusalem Center for Public affairs revealed that).
The Lavi was scarcely better than a C Block 50 F-16 and inferior to the F/A-18F Super Hornet.
#9
Actually I like you OldSpook---you're soo well informed & intelligent. Knowing you helps me to understand how USA went from being Word's bastion of free enterprise to socialism in two generations.
#10
Just like knowing you tells us all about how Israel went from the Yom Kippur War to tolerating Hamas and Hezbollah running mini-states on its borders.
Tehreek-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat Muhammadi (TNSM) chief Sufi Muhammad, who signed a controversial peace deal with the NWFP government on Monday, said he hated democracy and wanted supremacy of Islam over the entire world.
"From the very beginning, I have viewed democracy as a system imposed on us by the infidels. Islam does not allow democracy or elections," he told Deutsche Presse-Agentur in an interview held a few days before the government accepted his demand of enforcing sharia in the region. "Had the government accepted our demands in 1994, we would have not seen the violence we are seeing today," he added. Sufi Muhammad's son-in-law, Mullah Fazlullah, has fostered the violence in the name of Islam.
Sufi Muhammad said he was against shedding the blood of Muslims, however, added the government should have talked to the Taliban instead of taking military action. He pledged to work for complete peace in Swat if the government enforces Islamic laws, a demand which has now been met.
"I believe the Taliban government formed a complete Islamic state, which was an ideal example for other Muslim countries. Had this government remained intact, it could have led to the establishment of similar Islamic governments in many other countries," he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#1
And obambi wants world socialism with monopoly money. Seems like we'll get both at the same time if the MSM has any say...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
02/18/2009 5:19
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#2
Islam does not allow democracy or elections...
Over the history of islam, how has that worked out for you? What's that definition of insanity? "Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."
#3
At least the old bastard is honest. Now if more in the West would actually listen and look at the evidence, we might come to the proper conclusion: they mean it.
#5
or is he engaging in Taqqiya and he really is a closet democrat (small "d")? That's the trouble with the islamic "it's OK to lie" thing - you never know when they're telling the truth.... but in this case I'd be willing to bet a buck or two on it...
Posted by: Titus Greanter7610 ||
02/18/2009 12:17
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#6
That just leads naturally to the next atep. When in doubt, take them out.
Personnel of intelligence agencies on Tuesday arrested three alleged terrorists from the walled city and seized explosive material from their possession. The terrorists were arrested near Lohari Gate and two hand grenades, some live detonators, and other explosive material were recovered. They hailed from the northern areas and were arrested on the information received from terrorists arrested earlier. They had been involved in attacking NATO supply trucks and came to Lahore to create unrest in the city. The accused have been shifted to an unidentified place for inquiry.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has called for a new world order based on new ideas, saying the era of tyranny has come to a dead-end.
In an exclusive interview with Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB), Ahmadinejad noted that it is time to propose new ideologies for running the world. He said the time of tyrannical regimes is over and arrogant powers can no longer proceed with business as usual since their capitalism-based economies are collapsing.
"Tyrannical regimes will not last forever and they will reach their end sooner or later," Ahmadinejad stated.
We keep hoping, Mahmoud, we keep hoping ...
The president said people across the globe are fed up with the slogans of the arrogant powers. He cited the widespread protests in countries like Iraq and Afghanistan, where he believes the major powers' policies are failing.
"Any civilization or empire that wants to impose its ideas on others through the use of force will reach its end in the near future," he said. Iran can present new ideas and views, which the world will need in the future, he added.
The Iranian president stated that Israel's defeat in its Gaza offensive was the beginning of a new order in the world. "Now they are in disarray and new developments are unfolding."
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#1
Dude, I've not been following my fellow frech wingnuts' websites for a while, since I'm real tired of the crap there, but I've still browsed a big one yesterday, to keep informed about the latest carBBQ, atrocious rapes and such, and apart from the domestic stuff, as always, the international part was appaling (the USA soon to break up & fall apart as "States ask for independency", the Final Crisis of Capitalism, the Evils of rampant free-markets,...), and, the felows there REALLY got mad when sarko asked for a "New World Order". In fact, every time a western pol sez such a coded phrase, the guys there go apesh*t.
BUT, when the angry dwarf sez what, how will they react? I mean, some of them love the guys, as he opposes the "Empire", and, essentially, he's not considered one of the "bad guys", he's part of the "good team", with chavez, china, and, overall, putin, the new Man on a Horse of the mainstream of the french wingnuts. So, it's a "good" NWO, am I right? (Obviously, those people are not "right", they're unacknowledged socialists).
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has ousted Ahmed Qurei (Abu Ala) from his post as the chief of the team negotiating with Israel due to his inflexible positions and has replaced him with Saeb Erekat, the London-based Arabic daily Asharq Alawsat reported Tuesday.
The paper quoted senior Palestinian sources who said that Abbas's advisers were accusing Qurei of expressing his own personal opinions during negotiations with Israel. In September 2008, an argument erupted between the two after Qurei "refused to relay to Abbas an agreement proposal from Prime Minister Ehud Olmert," the sources said.
"There was a possibility that the agreement would have been presented to then-US president George Bush so that he could announce it, but Qurei refused and would not go to the US with Abbas," they added.
The paper said that the US had been giving Qurei the cold shoulder since September and accusing him of stubbornness. Israel has also been critical of Qurei for similar reasons.
Erekat was quoted by the paper as confirming the details of the report.
Speaking to The Jerusalem Post, the Palestinian Authority would not confirm that Qurei had been removed.
Sources close to Abbas told the paper that Qurei was still charged with handling the final-status negotiations, while Erekat was handling talks pertaining to daily life in the territories. The sources said that PA Prime Minister Salaam Fayad was in charge of the implementation of the road map plan.
Qurei, a former PA prime minister, headed a Fatah delegation to Cairo to discuss reconciliation with Hamas over the weekend. He is considered a possible successor to Abbas as president of the Palestinian Authority.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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Clashes between Taliban insurgents and the Afghan army have left at least ten people dead in southern Afghanistan.
Eight militants and two Afghan soldiers were killed on Tuesday in clashes in Helmand province, a Press TV correspondent reported.
Thirteen insurgents were taken prisoner after they surrendered to Afghan troops following a heavy exchange of fire.
The troops came under attack by the insurgents in Nadali town while they were on a drug control campaign in the region.
Opium production has significantly increased since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.
The United Nations estimates that almost 9000 tons of opium were cultivated in Afghanistan in 2007, with a street value of about $4 billion.
A recent UN Office on Drugs and Crime report says opium production has doubled in the past two years and that Helmand province is now the biggest single drug-producing area in the world -surpassing whole countries.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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Security forces on Tuesday killed six Taliban during their ongoing operation to target suspected hideouts in Bajaur Agency, officials said. "Six militants were killed and scores injured during shelling by gunship helicopters in Inayat Qilay, Bhaicheena and Umerey areas in Mamoond tehsil," the officials said on condition of anonymity. The Taliban fired several rockets on agency headquarters Khar, killing one woman and injuring four other people, local residents said. According to AFP, three other civilians, in addition to the woman, were also killed after Taliban rockets hit houses, paramilitary barracks and a school. A security official and an intelligence official confirmed the death tolls, it added. The rocket attack created panic in the town, and all markets and government offices were shut down, residents said. However, the political administration relaxed curfew from 7am to 5pm in the surrounding areas.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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TUCSON, Ariz. A federal jury found Tuesday that a southern Arizona rancher didn't violate the civil rights of a group of illegal immigrants who said he detained them at gunpoint in 2004. The eight-member civil jury also found Roger Barnett wasn't liable on claims of battery and false imprisonment.
But the jury did find him liable on four claims of assault and four claims of infliction of emotional distress and ordered Barnett to pay $77,804 in damages $60,000 of which were punitive.
Barnett declined to comment afterward, but one of his attorneys, David Hardy, said the plaintiffs lost on the bulk of their claims and that Barnett has a good basis for appeal on the two counts on which he lost. "They won a fraction of the damages they were seeking," Hardy said.
All six plaintiffs are citizens of Mexico, five of whom are living in the United States with visa applications pending, and the sixth resides in Mexico but was allowed into the U.S. for the trial, said Nina Perales, an attorney with the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund. She declined to say where in the U.S. they're residing.
Perales called the outcome "a resounding victory that sends a message that vigilante violence against immigrants will not be tolerated."
Sorta like how the Battle of Santa Cruz was a resounding victory for Santa Anna ...
David Urias, attorney for the plaintiffs, said, "Obviously we are disappointed with some aspects of the verdict. But I think that overall this was a victory for the plaintiffs."
For years, Arizona has been the busiest point along the Mexican border for illegal immigrants entering the United States. For more than a decade, Barnett has been a controversial figure in southern Arizona. He's known for aggressively patrolling his ranch property and along highways and roads in the area, often with his wife and brothers, on the lookout for illegal immigrants.
The plaintiffs alleged that Barnett threatened them with his dog and told them he would shoot anyone who tried to escape.
You were on the man's property. And you and your mates are rather nasty. I think I'd keep my shotgun on you myself ...
Barnett's lawyers argued that his land was inundated with illegal immigrants who left trash on his property, damaged his water supply and harmed his cattle.
Barnett's wife and a brother were dismissed as defendants; in addition, 10 more people initially named as plaintiffs were dropped from the proceedings.
Barnett has been known to wear a holstered 9-mm pistol on his hip and upon coming across groups of migrants, to flash a blue and gold badge resembling that of the highway patrol, with the wording "Barnett Ranch Patrol. Cochise County. State of Arizona."
The Barnetts detain and turn over those whom they encounter to the U.S. Border Patrol. In 2006, Barnett estimated that he had detained more than 10,000 illegal immigrants in 10 years.
His actions have resulted in formal complaints from the Mexican government against what it considers vigilante actions, and in several other lawsuits, including one stemming from an October 2004 incident. In that case, a jury awarded a family of Mexican-Americans on a hunting trip $100,000 in damages, later upheld by the Arizona Supreme Court.
Barnett's 22,000-acre ranch, about five miles north of the Mexican border, includes private and federal lease holdings in addition to nearly 14,000 acres of state-leased land.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009
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#1
I get it, "How dare be successful gotta punish him so he stops."
Posted by: Rednek Jim ||
02/18/2009 0:40
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#2
Second thought, name and investigate the lawyers suing him, put them out of the law business if at all posible.
Posted by: Rednek Jim ||
02/18/2009 0:42
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#3
It would be nice of the plaintiffs were returned home as well.
#4
Jim I don't think you realize how far gone the legal profession is. I attended law school in Arizona and my college admitted a felon who bound two DEA agents, hauled them into the desert, and executed them. They justified his admission by claiming that he'd give his fellow students a "unique perspective" on the criminal justice system. We don't need to eliminate the lawyers, we need to eliminate the profession.
#9
All six plaintiffs are citizens of Mexico, five of whom are living in the United States with visa applications pending,
What the hell is this? While their visa applications are pending - in other words they are being allowed to live here ILLEGALLY? Shouldn't they be banned for life for violating the border?
#10
The US Government has betrayed this guy and his property rights for years by not securing the border. The betrayal continues by permitting him to be tried in a US court by foreigners. Unfortunately, I suspect we'll see more of this in the coming days.
#11
I attended law school in Arizona and my college admitted a felon who bound two DEA agents, hauled them into the desert, and executed them. They justified his admission by claiming that he'd give his fellow students a "unique perspective" on the criminal justice system.
This is an "Alice through the looking glass perspective." Criminal behavior is rewarded? Rancher Roger Barnett who defended himself and his property should be hired as an Adjunct Professor at this school by this reasoning--he has a "unique perspective" on the criminal justice system--defending your rights. Maybe he should have called an attorney for an "emergency lawsuit" when these coyotes traipsed across his property. WTF? We are becoming a nation of "attorney guided sheep." Citizen arrest is apparently a dead concept. Only police can make arrests?
#12
Mexicans (even illegals) outnumber and have more political clout than ranchers.
Posted by: ed ||
02/18/2009 9:07
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#13
Were I in this rancher's shoes, I would use an alternative technique to policing my land. I would invite some Apaches from the reservation to set up camp to investigate some "Apache religious artifacts" that might be there.
Of course, while they were camped there, it would be up to them to provide security against anyone intending to "loot" their sacred artifacts.
And, because Apaches see themselves as directly above Mexicans on the food chain, pretty soon word would get back to Mexico that my land is a place that Mexicans had better avoid.
#15
It strikes me that there should be some kind of Malfeasance or Dereliction of Duty case here against the US Border Patrol; it is beyond reasonable that this guy's ranch should have so many border jumpers that he can catch 3 a day, for ten years, by himself.
Sudan and Darfur's most active rebel group signed an accord on Tuesday paving the way for broader peace talks to end a conflict that has claimed the lives of several hundred thousand people in six years.
"This is an important turning point in the Darfur conflict," said Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani, whose country hosted a week of talks between the Khartoum government and the Justice and Equality Movement. "I am very optimistic, as both sides are determined to end this conflict," he said at a press conference following the signing. The Doha talks were the first contacts since 2007 between the government and representatives of the JEM, which boycotted another largely abortive Darfur peace deal in 2006.
"The accord stipulates that negotiations continue toward a final peace agreement, in a period no longer than three months," Sudan's ambassador to Qatar, Abdullah al-Faqiri told AFP. "We will reach a final and just solution with God's will, to end this war, which ... will be the last war in Sudan," JEM leader Khalil Ibrahim said at the press conference. He said that "in a sign of goodwill," the JEM would release a number of prisoners from the government side.
Prisoner exchange: The Sudanese ambassador said that the agreement provided for an exchange of prisoners in the near future. Sheikh Hamad, who is also Qatar's foreign minister, said on Monday that he hoped negotiations on a ceasefire and a prisoner swap would be launched in two weeks. JEM member Tahar el-Fakih told the official Qatar News Agency: "The two sides have committed themselves in principle to an exchange of prisoners, to be freed in successive groups between now and the launch of talks on a framework agreement on peace in Darfur."
The JEM leader said the group is keen to include all warring factions in the negotiations, and called on Sudan's neighbours Chad, Egypt, Libya and Eritrea as well as the international community to join the talks. The sponsors of the Doha talks - Qatar, the United Nations, African Union and Arab League - stressed that they were preliminary and intended to pave the way for a broader peace conference on Darfur.
The most heavily armed of the Darfur rebel groups, the JEM declined to sign the 2006 peace deal signed by one other faction and in May last year launched an unprecedented assault on the Sudanese capital. According to the United Nations, 300,000 people have died and more than 2.2 million fled their homes since ethnic minority rebels in Darfur rose up against the Arab-dominated Khartoum government in February 2003. Sudan, whose President Omar al-Beshir is facing a possible international arrest warrant for alleged war crimes including genocide in Darfur, puts the death toll at 10,000.
Tuesday's accord followed a long meeting on Monday between the heads of the two delegations, Ibrahim for the JEM and Nafie Ali Nafie, a top aide to Beshir. Ibrahim had said at the start of the talks that broader peace negotiations would only be possible if the government was prepared to accept the winding up of allied Arab militias in Darfur and allow high-level rebel representation in the central government. He said confidence-building measures should include the expansion of aid deliveries to rebel-held areas as well as the release of JEM prisoners.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#2
This reminds me of the series of Jimmy Carter brokered peace deals involving the same Bashir government in the early to mid-1990s. Carter continually sang the tune that peace between Khartoum and the southern Sudan SPLA was just around the corner. Bashir found him a useful idiot. I fear the same thing is happening with the JEM, and Bashir is just trying to gain some tactical advantage.
#3
This reminds me of the series of Jimmy Carter brokered peace deals involving the same Bashir government in the early to mid-1990s. Carter continually sang the tune that peace between Khartoum and the southern Sudan SPLA was just around the corner. Bashir found him a useful idiot. I fear the same thing is happening with the JEM, and Bashir is just trying to gain some tactical advantage.
#4
The headline should read, Genocide nearly complete. Sudan now willing to stop the killings. Good lord, the Sudanese government first killed most, if not all the Christians down south, where was the press on that one? Now they are almost done with the genocide in Darfur. I wonder what the real body count is. Must be comparable to Cambodia, we will never know.
And of course, like Cambodia, Bosnia, and the rest, guys like Carter and the UN continue to talk with no action.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
02/18/2009 20:28
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GAZA, Feb 18 (Reuters) - Israeli aircraft struck two targets in the southern Gaza Strip on Wednesday causing some damage but no casualties, local Palestinian residents and Hamas security officials said. An Israeli army spokesman confirmed that aircraft had hit targets in Gaza but had no further details.
Residents said one air strike targeted tunnels which run under the Egyptian border at the town of Rafah that militants use to smuggle arms into the Gaza Strip. Another hit an already bombed-out security compound in the town of Khan Younis.
The strikes came in an apparent response to the firing of a mortar round by Gaza militants into Israel on Tuesday evening.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/18/2009
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#1
come on IAF... lets add some zeros after that number
Posted by: Abu do you love ||
02/18/2009 0:51
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#2
badly phrased article by Reuters
per Haaretz and JPost, seven tunnels were hit
also the security compound had the mosque still standing and the IDF may have thought (correctly?) ordinance was recently placed there
The Telegraph quoted United States intelligence sources as saying Israel is using sabotage, front companies and double agents to disrupt the Iranian regime's illicit weapons project as an alternative to direct military strikes.
Nevertheless, it should be noted that Israel has been carrying out similar covert activities for about a decade, ever since Iran was first suspected of seeking nuclear weapons. The U.S. journalist James Risen has written recently that the CIA and the Mossad have planned together a number of sabotage operations against the Iranian program, including damaging power lines to nuclear sites in order to cause harm to computer systems and equipment.
Operation Lemony Snickett is in full swing ...
The Telegraph also quoted Israeli officials as privately acknowledging the new U.S. administration is unlikely to sanction an air attack on Iran's nuclear installations and that President Barack Obama's offer to extend a hand of peace to Tehran puts any direct military action beyond reach for now.
As such, the reported goal of Israel's covert campaign is to delay or interrupt the Iranian research program, without engaging in a direct confrontation that could lead to a wider war.
"Disruption is designed to slow progress on the program, done in such a way that they don't realize what's happening. You are never going to stop it," a former CIA officer on Iran was quoted as saying.
"The goal is delay, delay, delay until you can come up with some other solution or approach," he added. "We certainly don't want the current Iranian government to have those weapons. It's a good policy, short of taking them out militarily, which probably carries unacceptable risks."
Posted by: Fred ||
02/18/2009
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#2
People always hope that there is "some other approach" out there that we just haven't figured out yet. And now with the best and brightest people ever to walk the earth assembled together under Obama, the bestest president ever, that other approach is bound to appear. Right? Beuhler?
#4
I once heard the brag of an EOD expert that he could shut down a major metropolitan area for a week, and on a budget. In this he included power, water, major transport, and much of its food supply. He estimated the cost at around $500.
But, he concluded, if you wanted quality work, it could cost ten times that amount.
Ever since then, I've wondered about his conjecture, and admit it makes a great thought problem.
#7
Are they really being assassinated? Could be suicide. Could be spontaneous human combustion. Could be a mold infection. Perhaps it's just that, like some things, some people are simply asking to be destroyed. Everything is possible. It's a weird, big world.
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.
The US government may have to nationalise some banks on a temporary basis to fix the financial system and restore the flow of credit, Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve chairman, has told the Financial Times.
WASHINGTON -- For the first time, some airline passengers will skip metal detectors and instead be screened by body scanning machines that look through clothing for hidden weapons, the Transportation Security Administration said Tuesday.
Christopher Bidwell, security chief at the Airports Council International trade group, said the scanner "really does not reveal as much as some people might think." 
Texas financier R. Allen Stanford is accused of cheating 50,000 customers out of $8 billion dollars but despite raids Tuesday of his financial empire in Houston, Memphis, and Tupelo, Miss., federal authorities say they do not know the current whereabouts of the CEO.
In three months since Election Day, at least a half-dozen prominent journalists have taken jobs working for the federal government. 
It has taken Susan Erb just three years to see the value of her Merced, California, home plunge by more than half to $350,000. Next month, her mortgage payment jumps 20 percent to $3,321 and she knows she cant afford it. Her bank wont rework the loan unless she stops paying altogether. 
HAMPSHIRE soldiers were among troops who seized more than £50m worth of drugs during an operation in Afghanistan. 
Maydan Shahr, Afghanistan - The 3,000 new American troops who arrived in recent weeks in Logar and Wardak provinces, both of which border Kabul, face a formidable challenge: establishing control in areas with little government presence and where insurgents operate freely. 
It's time to shut down Hezbollah and Hamas broadcasts to the Continent.
What a joke. Your Congress has voted to spend almost $790 billion of your money on a stimulus package that not a single member of either chamber has read.
MAGAZINES are generally seen as good early warning signs for economic downturns. The thinking is that corporations would rather cut back on ads before they actually have to start cutting back on people. 
A Pakistani envoy has urged Dhaka to let "bygones be bygones" as he rejected Bangladeshi calls for help in prosecuting alleged war criminals. 
We've all been taught never to sign any document we haven't read. But that doesn't apply to the economic stimulus bill President Obama is signing today in Denver. 
It took a wedgie and a headlock to pin down a man suspected of breaking into a car. Yvonne Morris, a technician at the Brickyard Animal Hospital, said she chased a man who broke into a co-worker's car, but he kept squirming away from her. The third time, Morris grabbed hold of the man's boxer shorts and pulled. Salt Lake City police said she then she put a headlock on the man until help could arrive. The man was booked into the Salt Lake County jail on suspicion of vehicle burglary, possession of stolen property and outstanding warrants.
TNSM chief Sufi Muhammad said on Tuesday he would urge the Taliban to lay down their weapons. He told a gathering in Mingora he and his colleagues would continue their struggle until peace was restored in Malakand. The visit is part of the deal signed between a representative jirga of the TNSM and the NWFP government. A spokesman said the TNSM delegation would leave for Matta to talk with the Taliban on Wednesday. Sources said the delegation also met military officers and discussed the restoration of peace in Malakand.
Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers have stepped up conscription of child soldiers, the United Nations agency for children said on Tuesday, as the rebels prepare to face a final onslaught by the military.
Feb. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Crude oil traded below $35 a barrel in New York on speculation that U.S. stockpiles climbed for the 19th time in 21 weeks amid a drop in demand because of the global economic contraction.
Extremists pose a direct security threat to Pakistan and the US, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Tuesday, and vowed to push for more 'balance and harmony' in conducting US foreign policy. 
(AKI) - Yemeni police have arrested seven Saudi citizens allegedly linked to a local Al-Qaeda cell. According to the Saudi daily, Al-Watan, the seven were suspected of planning attacks against local oil fields and tourist spots in the Arab country.
The State Department said Tuesday the complete dismantling of North Korea's nuclear program remains the goal of the Chinese-led six-party negotiations with Pyongyang. The comment followed an assertion by a leading U.S. academic that North Korea appears determined to retain a small arsenal of nuclear weapons. 
After six years of silence, Dr Muhammad Amjad Khan, ex-husband of Dr 
North Korean leader Kim Jong Il issued Tuesday an open letter to the public, thanking it for nominating him as candidate to deputy in all constituencies for the upcoming parliament poll, official media reported early Wednesday. Kim said in the letter that he will be standing from the Supreme People's Assembly's constituency no. 333 at the election on March 8, the Korean Central News Agency reported.
President Asif Ali Zardari on Tuesday reiterated the commitment of his party and the government to preserve, protect and strengthen democracy.
Extension of the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation to the entire Malakand division does not mean the imposition of a Taliban-style regime, Awami National Party leader Afrasiyab Khattak has said. Khattak told a private TV channel on Tuesday that the regulation was a judicial system aimed at the provision of speedy justice to the people. He said the regulation had been operational in Malakand since 1994. "It was revised in 1999 and now we will revise it again in 2009," he added. He said the judiciary in Malakand was part of the regular judiciary of the country.
For people caught inside Mexico's drug corridors, life is about keeping your head down and watching your back, especially when the sun dips behind the cactus-studded horizon.
The Texas financier accused by the Securities and Exchange Commission Tuesday of "massive ongoing fraud" was a generous political donor who gave more heavily to Democrats. Since 2000, R. Allen Stanford, the chief of the Stanford Financial Group in Houston, his wife and company gave $2.2 million in political contributions -- $1.7 million to Democratic candidates and committees -- according to Federal Election Commission records.
OTTAWA (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said on Tuesday he still wants to reopen the North American Free Trade Agreement, despite a warning from Canada that this would be a mistake, but he said he did not want to end up curbing trade.
U.S. Sen. Roland Burris now acknowledges attempting to raise money for ousted Gov. Rod Blagojevich - an explosive twist in his ever-changing story on how he landed a coveted Senate appointment from the man accused of trying to sell the seat.
The House Energy and Commerce Committee is also looking at how it can put in place policies that would allow it greater oversight of the Internet. "Internet radio is becoming a big deal, and we're seeing that some web sites are able to control traffic and information, while other sites that may be of interest or use to citizens get limited traffic because of the way the people search and look for information," says on committee staffer. "We're at very early stages on this, but the chairman has made it clear that oversight of the Internet is one of his top priorities." 
Pakistan's religious scholars and Ulema have expressed reservations over the implementation of the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation 2009 in Malakand division, which was imposed after a deal was finalised between the NWFP government and Tehreek-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat Muhammadi (TNSM). 
At least four people were killed and 18 others injured on Tuesday when a powerful car bomb ripped through a street in Bazid Khel village on the outskirts of Peshawar, police and locals said.
Tehreek-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat Muhammadi (TNSM) chief Sufi Muhammad, who signed a controversial peace deal with the NWFP government on Monday, said he hated democracy and wanted supremacy of Islam over the entire world.
Personnel of intelligence agencies on Tuesday arrested three alleged terrorists from the walled city and seized explosive material from their possession. The terrorists were arrested near Lohari Gate and two hand grenades, some live detonators, and other explosive material were recovered. They hailed from the northern areas and were arrested on the information received from terrorists arrested earlier. They had been involved in attacking NATO supply trucks and came to Lahore to create unrest in the city. The accused have been shifted to an unidentified place for inquiry.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has called for a new world order based on new ideas, saying the era of tyranny has come to a dead-end. 
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has ousted Ahmed Qurei (Abu Ala) from his post as the chief of the team negotiating with Israel due to his inflexible positions and has replaced him with Saeb Erekat, the London-based Arabic daily Asharq Alawsat reported Tuesday. 
Clashes between Taliban insurgents and the Afghan army have left at least ten people dead in southern Afghanistan. 
Security forces on Tuesday killed six Taliban during their ongoing operation to target suspected hideouts in Bajaur Agency, officials said. "Six militants were killed and scores injured during shelling by gunship helicopters in Inayat Qilay, Bhaicheena and Umerey areas in Mamoond tehsil," the officials said on condition of anonymity. The Taliban fired several rockets on agency headquarters Khar, killing one woman and injuring four other people, local residents said. According to AFP, three other civilians, in addition to the woman, were also killed after Taliban rockets hit houses, paramilitary barracks and a school. A security official and an intelligence official confirmed the death tolls, it added. The rocket attack created panic in the town, and all markets and government offices were shut down, residents said. However, the political administration relaxed curfew from 7am to 5pm in the surrounding areas.
GAZA, Feb 18 (Reuters) - Israeli aircraft struck two targets in the southern Gaza Strip on Wednesday causing some damage but no casualties, local Palestinian residents and Hamas security officials said. An Israeli army spokesman confirmed that aircraft had hit targets in Gaza but had no further details.
The Telegraph quoted United States intelligence sources as saying Israel is using sabotage, front companies and double agents to disrupt the Iranian regime's illicit weapons project as an alternative to direct military strikes. 
