Pope Benedict XVI sounded the alarm about an "educational emergency" during a meeting with political leaders from Rome and he surrounding Lazio district. The "emergency" to which he referred was the growth of relativism. Young people, he said, find it difficult to develop "firm certainties and criteria upon which to build their lives." This failure of moral guidance threatens "the very basis of coexistence and the future of society."
A Slovakian television station has been fined $88,400, for making fun of a Vatican document on Christian driving, Agence France Presse reports. The program said that priests were "not the best experts" to give instructions on driving because the Vatican had "only 2 kilometers of highway and the last traffic accident was more than half a year ago." Slovakia's broadcasting council said that a program on the commercial station Joj abused viewers' religious sensibilities and was not objective.
Poor China...
Jesuits live in a time of waiting to fulfill their desire to return to China, said their superior-general, since the mission in that country is so directly linked with the foundations of the congregation. He spoke about the Jesuits' hopes to get back to China and other matters being discussed at their 35th General Congregation, which began Monday.
Misinformation about the Order of Malta puts the lives of volunteers offering humanitarian assistance in grave danger, said the group's grandmaster. In his traditional New Year's address, he spoke with the diplomatic corps accredited to the order.
The Order of Malta was founded in the 11th century and exists today as a sovereign subject of international law, with its own constitution, passports and public institutions. The order has diplomatic relations with 99 states. It is dedicated to the care of the poor and sick and offers services ranging from ambulances to homes for disabled children.
It is especially during the holidays that Rome earns her title of "caput mundi," or the head of the world. The streets teem with visitors from every corner of the world, and while they may poke around the various sites with interest, the gravitational pull comes from St. Peter's.
"The architecture of ancient Rome was 'baptized' for Christian use. Not just the forms and styles, but also the actual materials; starting with Constantine, columns and cornices were taken from pagan temples to construct churches. Ultimately, these buildings demonstrate a continuity with the past, but also a transformation from a pagan architecture into a Christian architecture."
Germany overturned the 1933 verdict against a Dutchman convicted at the beginning of the Nazi era for setting fire to the Reichstag parliament building in Berlin. Historians still debate whether he acted by himself or if the Nazis were involved in the crime.
A new rail freight service between Germany and China, that would be twice as quick as sea travel, has been backed by 6 countries. The China Daily state newspaper says China, Mongolia, Russia, Belarus, Poland and Germany are to work together on the Hamburg to Beijing train route.
China Railway Container Transport said the 20-day-long freight journeys should start in early 2009. Moving goods by sea between the 2 cities usually takes 40 days and means passing through the Indian Ocean, which adds an additional 10,000km to the journey.
The US and Germany have agreed to recognize Kosovo after it declares independence and to urge the rest of Europe to follow suit, say senior EU diplomats close to negotiations over Kosovo's future. President Bush and Chancellor Merkel agreed it was vital to recognize Kosovo to stabilize the western Balkans. The European officials said the US was aggressively pressing the EU to ensure that the recognition of Kosovo was not delayed by even a week.
"The cake has been baked, because the Americans have promised Kosovo independence," a senior EU official said. "And if Washington recognizes Kosovo and European nations do not follow, it will be a disaster."
Russia's newly-appointed ambassador to NATO criticised a key European arms treaty as "colonial" in an interview. "As far as the CFE is concerned, we must liberate ourselves from colonial dependency in the security sphere. The CFE in its original form is an anachronism of the Cold War."
Russia last month suspended adherence to the Conventional Forces in Europe treaty, which was signed in 1990 and regulates the deployment of armed forces across Europe and western Russia.
Some 200 right-wing activists gathered in central Jerusalem on Thursday evening to protest the ongoing visit of President Bush. The rally was organized by the 'SOS Israel' under the banner of praying for a unified Jerusalem. Protestors read psalms and carried signs, several of which warned that Bush and Prime Minister Olmert were "bringing another Holocaust."
In a letter handed to President Bush Thursday, former Sephardic Chief Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu admonished the US president to avoid any course of action that would harm the Jewish nation.
"The Jewish nation is eternal, and forever remembers those that have aided it throughout history, as well as those that have done it harm. Please let your name go down in history as a president who aided the Jewish nation, who worked alongside God and not against him. You were granted the privilege of serving as US president. Make the best of the duties given you, and we will fulfill our task of remembering you as good and noble throughout the ages."
The Rabbi stressed that "he prays for peace, as does any individual who believes in God," but that "anyone who accepts the bible as the word of God must keep in mind that God had promised the land of Israel to the Jewish people alone."
[WAR: No He did NOT!! There's 11 other tribes that have equal rights to the land! Besides, King George 3rd needs to realize that "The town of Aczib/Kezib will prove deceptive to the kings of Israel." (Micah 1:14)]
Prime Minister Olmert acted like a "sycophant" by excessively praising President Bush at their joint press conferences, rather than defending Israel's interests, senior Likud sources said Thursday.
The sources said Binyamin Netanyahu, in contrast, devoted his 45-minute meeting with Bush and other top American officials to pressing for Israel's security concerns and its history to be taken into account when decisions are being made about the country's fate. "Jerusalem has belonged to the Jewish people for 3,000 years and the Jewish people will ensure that it will remain undivided under Jewish sovereignty forever," Netanyahu told Bush.
But most of the meeting was devoted to the Iranian issue. Netanyahu pressed Bush to act against the Islamic Republic before he left office.
Israeli governments have pursued such divide-and-conquer strategies ever since the state was born. What the Israelis have always feared more than anything else is a unified opponent. And on the Israeli side, fear more than anything else is the obstacle to peace. That is George W. Bush's Israel problem – and ours.
Even sympathetic critics of Israeli policy usually fail to point out what every Palestinian knows all too well: Jewish fear comes from, and perpetuates, a confusion between past and present. Jews have been far too quick to identify Palestinians with Nazis. Jews have become victimizers because they have never ceased seeing themselves as victims. Indeed, an influential Jewish theologian once quoted an Israeli psychologist who said that so many Jews equated all Arabs with Nazis because they have "entered a holocaust psychosis."
In other words, fear has become a foundation stone of Jewish identity. Indeed, too many Jews define what it means to be Jewish largely in terms of persecution, oppression, and the need to resist anti-Semitic enemies. Without an enemy to fight they would be plunged into an identity crisis.
[WAR: This is why it's sooo important to revisit history and determine the truth of what really happened - and did not happen - during WW2. It has a direct bearing on the current geopolitical status quo. But since the proverbial cup is half-full, and there's a hole in the bottom, this will never happen.]
President Bush used characteristically homespun language today to call for an agreement on a Palestinian state by the time he leaves office, saying it must not be riddled like "Swiss cheese" with pockets of Israeli territory. "I believe it's going to happen, that there's going to be a signed peace treaty by the time I leave office."
But he disappointed many Palestinians when he showed no stomach to apply diplomatic pressure on Israel to remove the 420,000 Jewish settlers living on Palestinian land occupied in the 1967 war.
In fact Ehud Olmert, Israel's prime minister, used the opportunity of Bush's visit to state that Israel regards the larger settlements in the West Bank and those in Arab East Jerusalem as not up for negotiation.
(Also: Bush's Mideast pipe dream)
(Also: Bush pledges to return in May)
(Also: Cartoon: Bush legacy)
(Also: What hope for a peace treaty?)
The Turkish army has reportedly pounded areas across the border in northern Iraq with artillery fire, Iraqi officials say. The attack came hours after Turkish warplanes bombed border villages inside Iraq on Friday morning.
US planes dropped 40,000 pounds of explosives on Baghdad's southern outskirts Thursday in a 10-minute massive strike. The operation, called "Phantom Phoenix," is the 3rd in a series of recent Iraq-wide offensives against al-Qaeda.
[WAR: Call me paranoid, but I just hope there isn't some kind of "Phantom Phoenix" operation planned for the Palo Verde nuclear reactor (#3) near Phoenix during the Super Bowl...]
Rebel cleric Maulana Fazlullah, who was accused by President Musharraf of masterminding the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, on Thursday said he was not involved in her murder. "Bhutto's killing was a part of power politics. We have nothing to do with her and her family members know the killers well."
The US embassy in Islamabad has termed the reports connecting Washington to an international conspiracy behind Bhutto's assassination "completely outrageous and unfounded" amid fresh revelations that the slain leader had established indirect contacts with Dr Khan and Lt-Gen Gul shortly before her death.
US embassy spokesperson Elizabeth Colton was asked to comment on the growing perception in Pakistan that Bhutto's killing was part of an international conspiracy to which the US was said to be a leading part with the grand design of destabilising and denuclearising Pakistan.
President Musharraf warned that US troops would be regarded as invaders if they crossed into Pakistan's border region with Afghanistan in the hunt for al-Qaida or Taliban militants, according to an interview published today. "If they come without our permission, that's against the sovereignty of Pakistan. I challenge anybody coming into our mountains. They would regret that day."
Iran's oil trade is unaffected by international banking pressure and the country is exporting just over 2.4 million barrels per day of crude, a senior Iranian oil official said yesterday.
The Bush Administration has initiated an extremely dangerous war provocation just off Iran's coast, in the Strait of Hormuz. With Bush on his way to the Middle East to mobilize a collection of oil-rich US client states against Iran, the US government is working overtime to create a public-relations incident to heighten tensions in the region and threaten a new war.
The Bush Administration is clearly grasping for some excuse - any excuse - to attack Iran. Once the National Intelligence Estimate revealed that Bush has been lying about Iran's alleged nuclear weapons program, the hawks in his Administration have begun looking for any justification, real or fabricated, to sell a military attack they have been planning for years.
The real provocation here doesn't come from Iran. The US currently has half of its Navy off the coast of Iran. The US Navy has again and again held major war games to plan for and stage just such a confrontation with Iran. The Pentagon has announced that it has already set targets on thousands of sites in Iran.
(Also: Threat may not have been Iranian)
[WAR: Did they have an Israeli accent?...]
As much as I hate to say it, the video released by the state-controlled media of the tyrannical Iranian regime is more coherent, and far more credible than Washington's cock-and-bull story. And that's truly a very sad state of affairs.
Who are the real provocateurs? Well, we don't know the answer to that question, but given the track record of our own government, it would hardly come as a shock if it came out that the US version is a complete fabrication. As for the Iranians, no doubt their rather abbreviated clip has been edited to conform to Tehran's official story, and yet, in the balance of things, theirs is the more credible account.
After all, why would the Iranians needle us, and give Bush and the Israeli lobby the excuse they need to launch a war nobody wants? In short, it just doesn't make any sense for the Iranians to have done what they're accused of doing, and yet it does make perfect sense that an administration such as this one would create an "incident" in the run-up to launching an attack.
(Also: Fears about unintended clashes)
Speaking on Tuesday, Bush accused Iran of "a provocative act", saying: "It is a dangerous situation, and they should not have done it, pure and simple." Speaking in Jerusalem the following day after meeting with Israeli leaders, he went one step further, warning Tehran of "dangerous consequences" if US ships were attacked. "All options are on the table to protect our assets. My advice to them is, don't do it."
The Bush administration has been seeking at every turn to pressurise and provoke Iran. For the Bush administration, the incident in the Strait of Hormuz could not have been better timed to stymie the development of diplomatic relations with Iran, to heighten tensions in the region and possibly to justify a further US military buildup against Tehran. It cannot be ruled out that the US, which has a long history of engineering provocations, concocted this latest naval encounter to meet these political purposes.
President Bush is finishing his 3-day trip to Israel. But the main goal of Bush's Mideastern tour is not so peaceful as it may seem at first sight. The administrations of Mossad and Aman prepared a report for Shimon Peres to prove that Iran was going to build its first A-bomb during the coming several months.
(Also: Khatami: Close Iran nuclear case)
The wide-open and unpredictable Republican presidential race moved to religiously conservative South Carolina last night with a debate dominated by Iran and Ronald Reagan. The 5 candidates still in the running, argued who best embodied the legacy of Ronald Reagan and talked belligerently about Tehran.
Asked whether the American commanders on the scene were right in not attacking the Iranian boats, Huckabee said he backed their decisions, before warning Iran: "Be prepared, first, to put your sights on the American vessel. And then be prepared that the next thing you see will be the gates of Hell, because that is exactly what you will see after that."
Fred Thompson said of the Iranian boat crews: "I think one more step and they would have been introduced to those virgins that they're looking forward to seeing." The crowd cheered.
German press
The victories of Clinton and McCain in the New Hampshire primaries surprised many observers. German commentators agree that the race for the nominations is still very much up for grabs and speculate about Obama's chances.
A book on the Greek-Jewish roots of President Sarkozy, whose family can be traced back to the Jewish community in the northern port city of Thessaloniki, went on sale in Greece Thursday. The book written by three Greek authors gives a historical account of the maternal family of Sarkozy, who were a part of the Jewish community in Thessaloniki, once nick-named the "Jerusalem of the Balkans."
Oh, okay - I feel much better now ...
Crude oil at $100 a barrel would still be "pretty cheap" because global oil demand shows no signs of abating and new energy sources are in short supply, a prominent US oil analyst said.
The US is at risk of losing its top-notch triple-A credit rating within a decade unless it takes radical action to curb soaring healthcare and social security spending, Moody's, the credit rating agency, said yesterday. The warning over the future of the triple-A rating - granted to US government debt since it was first assessed in 1917 - reflects growing concerns over the country's ability to retain its financial and economic supremacy
Merrill Lynch is expected to suffer $15 billion in losses stemming from soured mortgage investments, almost double its original estimate, prompting the firm to raise additional capital from an outside investor. Merrill, the nation's largest brokerage firm, is expected to disclose the huge write-down when it reports earnings next week, according to people who have been briefed on its plans. The loss far exceeds the $12 billion hit many Wall Street analysts had forecast.
Bank of America said it has agreed to buy Countrywide Financial for $4 billion in stock, a deal that both rescues the country's biggest mortgage lender and expands the financial services empire of the nation's largest consumer bank. The acquisition will make Charlotte-based BOA the nation's biggest mortgage lender and loan servicer.
2008 will be characterized by a significant intensification of the economic and political crisis of the world capitalist system. The turbulence in world financial markets is the expression of not merely a conjunctural downturn, but rather a profound systemic disorder which is already destabilizing international politics. As always, the weakest links in the chain of imperialist geo-politics are the first to break. The assassination of Benazir Bhutto, the eruptions of civil wars in the Congo and Kenya, and the renewed tension in the Balkans over Kosovo are indicative of the increasingly explosive state of world politics.
Metropolitan Kyrill, foreign minister of the Russian Orthodox Church, discusses Christian values in the post-communist era, his relationship with the pope in Rome, Vladimir Putin the churchgoer - and wrangles with Spiegel about homosexuality.
Today in Scripture
* "The waters continued to recede until the 10th month, and on the 1st day of the 10th month the tops of the mountains became visible." (Gen 8:5)
* "So the exiles did as was proposed. Ezra the priest selected men who were family heads, one from each family division, and all of them designated by name. On the 1st day of the 10th month they sat down to investigate the cases." (Ezra 10:16)
Tomorrow night's sky
If you look in the southwestern sky a couple of hours after sunset on Saturday, you might spot a waxing crescent moon. You know that the moon passes through a series of phases. But did you know that you can tell where the sun is, just by observing the moon phase? It's especially easy with a crescent moon up to first quarter phase.
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