Friday

The Daily WAR (10-22)

Reading between the lines, and thinking outside the box . . .
 
 
 
    Pope Benedict said on Thursday that embryonic stem cell research, artificial insemination and the prospect of human cloning had "shattered" human dignity. In an address to members of the Vatican department on doctrinal matters, Benedict said the Church had a duty to defend the "great values at stake" in the field of bioethics.
    The speech was the latest in a series in which the conservative Pope has told his listeners that scientific progress should not be accepted uncritically. He said the Church was not against scientific progress but wanted it based on "ethical-moral principles." And this included total respect for the human being as a person "from conception until natural death," and respect for the natural transmission of life through sexual intercourse.
 
 
 
    The Family Ministry is pushing to have a book it says slurs Judaism, Christianity and Islam labeled dangerous for children. "The three large religions of the world, Christianity, Islam and Judaism, are slurred in the book. The distinctive characteristics of each religion are made ridiculous.
 
 
 
    As Europe's kings and queens approach their twilight years, it will soon be time for the elder generation to pass the mantle to their heirs apparent. The problem is, they don't want to.
 
    A British Euro MP has been threatened with expulsion from the EPP group of MEPs after likening new powers with those given to Hitler in 1933.
 
    After talks between Germany and Spain on climate change, terrorism and immigration, Prime Minister Zapatero and Chancellor Merkel heralded a new level of bilateral relations.
    The Spanish leader said that his country and Germany were cooperating closely in the fight against international terrorism, particularly that perpetrated by radical Islamic groups, and that they had also agreed to increase cooperation to promote the integration of immigrants.
    Merkel added that Germany wanted the European Union to play a more active role in the Mediterranean region. "Germany does not have any borders with the region, but shares responsibility for it."
 
    Statehood remains an elusive goal for Basque nationalists. Yet there's continued hope that they can follow the example of other European countries and find a peaceful resolution to their ongoing conflict with Spain.
 
    We believe an imposed settlement of the Kosovo question and seeking to partition Serbia's sovereign territory without its consent is not in the interest of the US. Attempting to impose a settlement on Serbia would be a direct challenge to the Russian Federation, which opposes any Kosovo settlement not accepted by Belgrade.
    Recognition of Kosovo's independence without Serbia's consent would set a precedent with far-reaching and unpredictable consequences for many other regions of the world.
 
    In a move that mirrors recent discussion amongst Russia's own top brass, NATO's April summit in the Romanian capital, Bucharest, is widely expected to discuss a report on a potential pre-emptive nuclear strike.
 
    If the Kremlin's new military doctrine endorses the General Staff's nuclear ideas, Russia will have new armed forces, with all the ensuing consequences. First, these forces will become strictly offensive because of the very nature of a pre-emptive strike.
    If the recent words of 4-star Gen. Yury Baluyevsky, the chief of the Russian General Staff, are heeded, Russia will have to equip all the services of its armed forces with permanently combat-ready nuclear weapons. Nobody can guess who will use them first.
    "We are not going to attack anyone," he reassured his audience, "but we want all our partners to realize that Russia will use armed force to defend its own and its allies' sovereignty and territorial integrity. It may resort to a pre-emptive nuclear strike in cases specified by its doctrine."
 
 
 
    Israel is being led by an unfit and incompetent prime minister, opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu said, one day after the release of the Winograd report on the failures of the government and the military during the Second Lebanon War.
    Netanyahu's Likud party convened a meeting in Tel Aviv Thursday to discuss the implications of the damning report. According to Netanyahu, Israel's citizens are demanding a new and worthy leader, and that will only come about via early elections.
 
    Lebanon's prime minister said that an Israeli report on the war against Hezbollah guerrillas in 2006 set the scene for a possible future conflict and failed to address "Israel's crimes against Lebanon".
    "The report calls for preparation for the next war, which shows that Israel has not learned the appropriate lesson from its defeat. The enemy's aims towards Lebanon have stayed the same -- that is attacking Lebanon in the future."
 
    Here is a letter written by Orthodox Jews in Jerusalem to the UN Secretary-General denouncing Israel's actions.
    "It is with a heavy heart that we write you from the city of Jerusalem. For 60 years the authorities of what is mischaracterized as the "Jewish State" have been undertaking a vicious campaign of oppression and ethnic cleansing against millions of Palestinians who currently still live in historic Palestine and who are refugees from Palestine in other countries.
    "And they have been committing all these crimes in the name of the ancient and holy Jewish religion! For 60 years the State of Israel has been desecrating and violating our sacred religion! For 60 years the State of Israel has been flaunting international law and UN General Assembly and Security Council resolutions! For 60 years they have been bringing Mankind to the edge of world war, claiming to do so in the name of Judaism!"
 
    Senior Iranian cleric Ayatollah Imami-Kashani says the US talks of Mideast peace while supporting the Zionist massacre of Palestinians. "The Christian Zionists (the US) and the Jewish Zionists (Israel) have joined forces to annihilate the Palestinian people. ... All nations take heed! These regimes will come after you, too!"
 
    So that the neoconservatives could strand astride Washington and the world, bellowing threats and beating their chests in the wake of 9/11, braying that everything – everything – had changed, especially the basic rules of human decency. Because it was "doable," as Paul Wolfowitz put it.
    Because our foreign policy is in large part built around the concept of making the Middle East safe for Israel. And, most of all, because of the sheer hubris of those who thought themselves above the laws of God and man – who thought they were gods, and let loose American thunderbolts with reckless abandon, with deadly consequences.
 
    The US secretary of defence, Robert Gates, has sent an "unusually stern" request to Germany to send more troops to southern Afghanistan, according to a German newspaper. The Süddeutsche Zeitung said the letter was sent 10 days ago to the German defence secretary. In it Gates demanded more troops and military vehicles such as helicopters.
 
    Africa is facing a genocide in Kenya and must make resolving the crisis a priority, the head of the African Union told the continent's leaders at Thursday's opening of a 3-day summit.
    "Kenya is a country that was a hope for the continent. Today, if you look at Kenya you see violence on the streets. We are even talking about ethnic cleansing, We are even talking about genocide. We cannot sit with our hands folded."
(Cartoon: Kenya burning)
 
    The International Rescue Committee (IRC) in late January 2008 released a new report on the mortality in the war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo. The report caught the eye of some news agencies, who quickly whipped up trite little articles as supposed expressions of horror. Over and over it has been declared "the world's forgotten crises."
    There are reasons why Darfur is in the crises of the day, the poster crises, and why Congo is hardly mentioned. However, the story of war and plunder in Congo is not unreported. It is a story that has been censored, manipulated, and covered up even while it is ostensibly being told. Just because the mainstream doesn't cover it, doesn't mean it didn't happen.
    Amongst the trustees or overseers of the IRC is Henry Kissinger, a man whose interests run very deep in Congo. Henry Kissinger is tied to Freeport McMoRan (FXC) and FCX is all over the copper and cobalt show in Katanga.
    The IRC is not a neutral or purely "humanitarian" organization. The IRC has a deep history of nefarious activities going far beyond relief operations. The IRC is also a huge financial operation providing scads of executives and business people with scads of income in ways that do not help to alleviate the war or suffering, but rather exacerbate it.
    The heartland of the Congo also has petroleum, and this is part of the reason for the unfathomable terrorism involving Western enterprises and agents and the concomitant rates of mortality in the interior.
 
 
 
    Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman said on Thursday that UN Security Council sanctions against Iran are in violation of the UN Charter. "There is no legal justification for passing resolutions against Iran, just as there was no justification for Tehran's nuclear dossier to be hauled before the UN Security Council."
 
    Customs police found radioactive material on a train heading to Iran from Kyrgyzstan, the Central Asian state said on Thursday. Kyrgyzstan's presidential press service said the unspecified cargo was intercepted in neighbouring Uzbekistan about a month ago and the train was sent back.
    In a statement, the official press service said the train had been inspected by Kyrgyz specialists before it left the ex-Soviet republic and the case was now under investigation. It did not identify the radioactive element or say how much was found.
    [WAR: But did Iran order it, or was it sent to provide more "proof" to back-up Bush's claims about Iran?]
 
    France's Defence Minister cast doubt on reports that Iran had halted its suspected nuclear weapons drive, speaking Thursday on a visit to Washington.
 
    The only noteworthy thing about Bush's State of the Union address was his unmistakable belligerence toward Iran. I'm betting that Bush will try to come to the American people once more before his term is up and declare that forces trained by Iran have attacked our troops in Iraq, and that he therefore is going after them.
    Listen to his words: "Above all, know this," Bush warned. "America will confront those who threaten our troops. We will stand by our allies, and we will defend our vital interests in the Persian Gulf."
    Even more ominous was Bush's line, "Our message to the people of Iran is clear: We have no quarrel with you." As Robert Fisk has pointed out, this is the mantra that Presidents use whenever they are about to attack another country. It is an imperial tic, a ritual throat-clearing before the war-making, the rattle of the snake before the lashing bite.
 
 
 
    The US military isn't ready for a catastrophic attack on the country, and National Guard forces don't have the equipment or training they need for the job, according to a report. The 400-page report concludes that the nation "does not have sufficient trained, ready forces available" to respond to a chemical, biological or nuclear weapons incident, "an appalling gap that places the nation and its citizens at greater risk."
 
     Germans are gaga over Barack Obama. He's got Japan pretty jazzed, too, along with Hillary Rodham Clinton. Russia's leaders, not so much: They prefer a Republican - as long as it's not Kremlin critic John McCain. And Mexico's president? He doesn't have much use for any of them.
    Africans naturally gravitate toward Obama, whose father was from Kenya. Israelis, though, seem to prefer Hillary Clinton - even though Obama has voiced support for key Israeli demands in peace talks with the Palestinians.
    America's extraordinary presidential campaign has captivated politicians and ordinary people around the globe. With so much at stake in the race for the White House, the world is watching with an intensity that hasn't been seen since the Clinton era began in 1992.
 
German press [on drugs!]
    John McCain and Mitt Romney are still bickering about who has the best conservative credentials, and the Republican campaign is getting bitter. But German commentators are backing McCain and predict that he will be running for the White House in November.
 
"Obama-nation" = abomi-nation?...
    For the most part, the debate was almost cloyingly cordial, leaving many in the Hollywood audience – gathered at the Kodak Theatre, where the Oscars are held – pondering a "dream ticket" of them eventually joining forces as presidential and vice-presidential candidates. Later on, Obama stated that Clinton would be "on anybody's short list" for the vice presidential nomination.
 
    Ron Paul is about to blow the lid off the whole political establishment, the whole crooked game of which McCain, Romney, Clinton, and Obama, for all their supposed differences, are all an intimate part.
    He has written The Revolution: A Manifesto. It covers everything establishment politicians lie about or ignore: war, sound money, terrorism, the economy, the IRS, civil liberties – you name it. It's written to be understood by ordinary people – and to wake them up.
 
    A book to be published next month contains an explosive allegation sure to call into question the independence of the 9/11 Commission: Its executive director secretly spoke with President Bush's close adviser Karl Rove and others within the White House while the ostensibly autonomous commission was completing its report.
    Philip Zelikow, a former colleague of then-National Security Adviser Condoleeza Rice, was appointed executive director of the 9/11 Commission despite his close ties to the Bush White House, and he remained in regular contact with Rove while overseeing the commission.
 
    Fascism is usually counted a movement of the Right; but, as Jonah Goldberg notes, many leftists viewed Mussolini with sympathy. H.G. Wells in a speech at Oxford in 1932 called for a "Liberal Fascism"; and Rexford Tugwell, a leading member of Roosevelt's Brain Trust, said in 1934, "I find Italy doing many of the things which seem to me necessary…. Mussolini certainly has the same people opposed to him as FDR has. But he has the press controlled so that they cannot scream lies at him daily."
 
 
 
    Somebody goofed. When Ben Bernanke cut interest rates to 3% Wednesday, the price of a new mortgage went up. How does that help the flagging housing industry? Is that what Bernanke had in mind, to stick another dagger into the already-moribund real estate market?
    Some critics say that he just wanted to throw a lifeline to his fat-cat investor buddies on Wall Street by providing more liquidity for the markets. But that's not it, at all. The fact is Bernanke had no choice. He's facing a challenge so huge and potentially catastrophic that cutting rates must have seemed like the only option he had.
    The banks are busted. A careful review of these graphs should convince even the most hardened skeptic that the banking system is basically underwater and insolvent. We are entering uncharted waters...
 
    In a drastic step, the Fed has lowered its key interest rate to 3.0%, the 2nd large cut in 2 weeks. Critics warn that the move poses its own dangers -- and may even seduce banks into taking bigger risks. "I think the Fed is bonkers. (Fed officials) frequently swear to themselves and to each other that they are not going to ease (interest rates) excessively, and then the economy slows a little and they do just that."
 
    One question I am asking myself - and I am not generally a conspiracy theorist - is whether the Fed reluctantly accepts the rise in inflation, or whether a rise in inflation is actively pursued. The big losers in the short-run will be foreign central banks and other foreign investors, but who cares about those?
    So the credit bust of 2007 is very likely to followed by the granddaddy of all financial crises, a bond market meltdown that will severely shake investor confidence in the US.
 
    Last summer, I observed that there was a "solvency crisis" underneath the ongoing subprime mortgage liquidity squeeze. Central banks can alleviate a "liquidity crisis", but they cannot solve a solvency crisis. Last year also, before the events, I warned that the US was heading toward stagflation.
    Now, stagflation is here. Economic growth is slowing down, M3 money supply numbers, as a measure of overall liquidity in the economy, are in the double digits range, the yield curve has inverted and become negative and the US dollar has become one the weakest currencies in the world. All this as American twin deficits are at record levels.
    The downturn in the world stock markets during this month is another clear indication that something is wrong, not only with the US economy, but also with the world economy.
 
    Inflation in the euro zone rose at the fastest pace on record in January, official data showed Thursday, highlighting the difficult task facing the European Central Bank as it seeks to enforce price stability in the face of slowing economic growth.
    Inflation has become a worldwide problem, as oil prices hover above $90 a barrel and the conversion of farmland to grow biofuel crops increases food prices. Global policy makers are being confronted by the very real danger of stagflation - anemic economic growth and upward pressure on prices.
 
    French bank BNP Paribas revealed it had its eye on crisis-hit Societe Generale, while voices in the EU were raised against France for vowing to ward off hostile bids. Foreign banks including Britain's HSBC and Barclays, Germany's Deutsche Bank, Spain's Banco Santander and Italy's UniCredit have all been cited as potential bidders for the bank.
    But there has been rising speculation the French government is planning to back a merger between BNP Paribas and Societe Generale to preempt a foreign takeover. Prime Minister Francois Fillon fired a warning shot, insisting Societe Generale should remain a "great French bank" and that the government would fight off "hostile raids."
 
    The economic bubble that lifted the stock market to dizzying heights was sustained as much by cheap oil as by cheap (often fraudulent) mortgages. Likewise, the collapse of the bubble was caused as much by costly (often imported) oil as by record defaults on those improvident mortgages.
    Oil, in fact, has played a critical, if little commented upon, role in America's current economic enfeeblement -- and it will continue to drain the economy of wealth and vigor for years to come.
 
    The financial crisis in the US and the expanded growth of the world economy, especially over the past 7 years in the less developed countries, are not separate events, but different sides or aspects of a single process.
    To put it in a nutshell: The expanded growth of China (along with other countries) would not have been possible without the massive growth of debt in the US. But this growth of debt, which has sustained the US economy as well as global demand, has now resulted in a crisis. There is now wide recognition that the credit crunch has major implications for the stability of the world capitalist economy.
    It is clear, even from this limited range of statistics, that the world capitalist order is facing a series of problems which have struck at the very heart of the global financial system. Martin Wolf of the Financial Times warns that it is the end of the Anglo-Saxon model.
 
    The recently concluded conference of the World Economic Forum in Davos may truly be described as the gathering of the most powerful and influential unbridled capitalists in the world.
    Globalism, in short, is a system which treats capital as supreme — supreme enough to be beyond the power of national governments to control and regulate.
    No wonder the late Pope John Paul II described it — this unbridled capitalism — as an evil. An evil as evil as communism. What isn't generally known, however, is that if John Paul II hated communism to the bone, he hated capitalism just as much. In fact, he considered communism and capitalism as the 2 evils of which the world must beware, guard and fight against.
    The Church has always been anti-capitalist. It has always considered capitalism — particularly capitalism of the unbridled variety or what passes for "liberal" or "laissez-faire" capitalism, as a social system that goes against the essential grain of the Church's social doctrines.
 
 
 
    A study published in Science Magazine today presents new evidence supporting the abiotic theory for the origin of oil, which asserts oil is a natural product the Earth generates constantly rather than a "fossil fuel" derived from decaying ancient forests and dead dinosaurs.
 
    High-technology services across large tracts of Asia, the Middle East and North Africa were crippled Thursday following a widespread Internet failure which brought many businesses to a standstill and left others struggling to cope.
    Industry experts are blaming damage to 2 undersea cables but it is not known what caused the damage. An official at an Egyptian ministry told AP it was believed that a boat's anchor may have caused the problems, although this was unconfirmed.
 
Because it itches!...
    Scientists are now finding that the nerve-based conversation between the skin and the brain is far more complex than most people realize.
 
    In western countries in the Northern Hemisphere the official first day of Spring is about 6 weeks after Groundhog Day, on March 20 or 21. About 1,000 years ago, before the adoption of the Gregorian calendar when the date of the equinox drifted in the Julian calendar, the spring equinox fell on March 16 instead.
    This was exactly 6 weeks after February 2. Assuming that the equinox marked the first day of spring in certain medieval cultures, as it does now in western countries, Groundhog Day occurred exactly 6 weeks before spring.
    Therefore, if the groundhog saw his shadow on Groundhog Day there would be 6 more weeks of winter. If he didn't, there would be 42 more days of winter. In other words, the Groundhog Day tradition may have begun as a bit of folk humor.
    Alternatively, the custom could have been a folk embodiment of the confusion created by the collision of 2 calendrical systems. Some ancient traditions marked the change of season at cross-quarter days such as Imbolc when daylight first makes significant progress against the night.
    Other traditions held that Spring did not begin until the length of daylight overtook night at the Vernal Equinox. So an arbiter, the groundhog / hedgehog, was incorporated as a yearly custom to settle the 2 traditions.
 
 
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