Reading between the lines, and thinking outside the box . . .
B16's Q&A session with Roman clergy (part 5)
The head of the Congregation that oversees the Church in the Holy Land, has appealed to the Catholic Church to provide assistance to the Christians there, so that "the future may be welcomed with hope."
The summons to support Christians in the Holy Land went out in the form of a letter to Catholic bishops all over the world, and to their respective Churches. The cardinal's appeal was made on behalf of Pope Benedict XVI, and asked for continued spiritual and material support for the Catholic community in the Holy Land.
(And: Full text of letter)
Pope Benedict XVI called Sunday on Lebanon to find a "president for all Lebanese" in order to end tension and contribute to reconciliation in the country. He said Lebanon had been unable to elect a head of state for nearly 3 months. He also said he was concerned in view of the unusually harsh tone of the differences between rival groups and the threats of violence to remove opponents.
Tempted by the prize of a historic visit to China by Pope Benedict XVI, the nation's leaders have authorised a renewed effort in confidential discussions with the Vatican to heal their rift and inaugurate diplomatic ties.
The talks have intensified over recent months, leading some diplomatic observers in Beijing to believe the Chinese may be seeking to announce a deal before the Olympic Games in August.
The de facto head of Beijing's official Patriotic Church, has said on several occasions that he would like to welcome the Pope to China once an agreement has been reached. While the Vatican says it has received no formal invitation, observers say his words would have been uttered only with approval from the highest levels.
Faith and reason are at the core of the collaboration between the US and the Holy See to protect the rights of all people, said the new US envoy to the Holy See, Mary Ann Glendon.
"Both the Holy See and the United States have a long history in which faith and reason are inseparably united in that quest. The United States is committed to make that vision a reality through vigorously promoting human rights, religious freedom, and through striving to foster dialogue and tolerance among persons of different faiths and cultures."
Germany's role in WW2 has made it difficult to win public support for military action in Afghanistan, the German ambassador to Britain has admitted. He said Germans had so often been told that their military had done "many awful things" it was hard to persuade them they should get involved in another conflict.
But he said that Germany had done more to help Afghanistan than any other European nation, including Britain. "In terms of financial assistance, civilian aid, military commitments, we would probably be the number one country."
[Europress] [Russopress]
In most ways that count, Italy has not had a government since the first days of February, when President Napolitano singed a decree that dissolved parliament. Since then, there has been no democratically elected figure or body charting the government's course.
New elections have been called for 13-14 April. Until then Italy is set to continue existing in this vague and uncharted middle ground between a working democracy and a modern version of anarchy.
But something interesting is happening in this governmentless state: The government is working. And in many ways, it is working better than it did in the weeks leading up to Prodi's unceremonious resignation.
Freed from the need to worry about the political implications of every move, ministers, bureaucrats and managers are simply doing their jobs - even when those jobs have international implications.
President Sarkozy has finally succeeded in imposing the Lisbon Treaty on the French population, with critical assistance from the Socialist Party. These manoeuvres on the part of the SP were born of fear that Sarkozy might lose the vote and the interests of French imperialism in Europe would be endangered.
The ruling elites of France and Europe feared that the French working class, in opposition to Sarkozy's dismantling of the welfare state and attacks on living standards and democratic rights, would again scupper their plans.
The Czech parliament narrowly re-elected Vaclav Klaus, a right-wing Euroskeptic as the country's president on Friday, averting a political crisis and ending a bitter campaign.
He remains known for his conservative credentials, emphasizing the importance of traditional values during the campaign. "If you do not want to respect our thousands of year old civilization, its Christian values and emphasis on the traditional family and respect for each individual life, do not vote for me."
He is a fierce Euroskeptic who is opposed to any transfer of powers from nation states to the EU.
Kosovo's parliament has overwhelmingly endorsed a declaration of independence from Serbia in an historic session. The US and a number of EU countries are expected to recognise Kosovo on Monday.
With Kosovo's parliament largely expected to declare independence from Serbia today, this week will be dominated by the aftermath of the Serbian province's declaration and all eyes will be set on the EU, expecting a reaction from the 27-nation bloc.
Britain's overstretched Armed Forces are to send as many as 1,000 troops to the Balkans in a move that will see the military's last remaining reserve unit deployed on operations.The imminent departure of the 1st Bn Welsh Guards to Kosovo has been ordered in response to fears that the newly formed independent state could slide into "ethnic cleansing".
The EU is sending in a police and military intervention force into Kosovo in derogation of of Serbia's sovereignty and in violation of of international law. This mission has all the features of an illegal occupation force by a foreign power, with a view to enforcing secession and installing an "Independent" Kosovo which will essentially function as an EU-US protectorate under military rule.
From one day to the next, the EU takes over the functions of a UN "peace-keeping mission", in derogation of United Nations procedures. No formal decision has been taken by the UN to hand over its authority to a military-civilian EU "peacekeeping" adminstration.
Serbia, furious at the imminent loss of a region that it regards as the cradle of its Church and nation, has said that it will fight to prevent Kosovo's independence becoming a reality. Fears of violence from Kosovo's dwindling Serb minority rose with an announcement from Serbian leaders in the divided city of Mitrovica that they would not recognise secession and that they would set up their own parliament.
Kosovo's unilateral declaration of independence, and especially its recognition by European countries, would open up a Pandora's Box. It may create a precedent for other separatist republics and autonomous regions.
Basques may demand secession from Spain, Tiroleans could secede from Italy and Hungarians from Romania. North Caucasians may demand secession from Russia, and Bavaria may insist on independence from the Federal Republic of Germany.
The independence of Kosovo will be the beginning of the end of today's Europe because the current status of Kosovo is fixed by a UN Security Council Resolution (1244). If the EU and the US override that resolution, which says Kosovo is part of Serbia, they will have once again demonstrated their contempt for international law and shown themselves to be unreliable international partners.
Unfortunately, developments in Kosovo show that geopolitics can easily defeat moral and legal principles in the 21st century.
Sean Connery thinks a Scottish nation is a bonnie notion. How about Spain's Basque country becoming a real country? And what's wrong with a People's Republic of Vermont?
Kosovo's looming independence raises all those questions and more. For starters: Why is statehood OK for some people but frowned on for others? After all, isn't the right to self-determination the essence of democracy itself?
There are at least 2 dozen secessionist movements active in Europe alone, and scores of others agitating for sovereignty around the globe. All of them, experts warn, will be emboldened by today's expected proclamation of the Republic of Kosovo.
Kosovo's imminent unilateral declaration of independence is set to drive deep divisions in the international community, with Russia and the EU at loggerheads over the planned breakaway from Belgrade. Even within the EU, 3 members are expected to reject formal recognition of the new-look Kosovo, and others will bide their time before coming to a decision.
Russia warned the West today that recognition of Kosovo's independence would affect its attitude towards 2 breakaway regions of neighbouring Georgia. "The declaration and recognition of the independence of Kosovo will doubtless have to be taken into account as far as the situation in Abkhazia and South Ossetia is concerned."
(Cartoon: Shattering Europe)
Mossad locates, eliminates Hezbollah terrorist
Members of Britain's intelligence service have confirmed that Imad Mughniyah, the assassinated Hezbollah terrorist leader, had undergone plastic surgery in a private clinic in East Berlin on his 40th birthday to help him outwit his hunters – the kidon of Mossad. Five birthdays later, however, he found himself in the crosshairs anyway, as members of Mossad caught up with him on a street in Damascus.
The operation began last Sunday when 3 Mossad agents, using Iranian passports, arrived in Damascus on different flights from Rome and Athens. One rented a car. Posing as tourists, they drove around the city. That evening they rented a lock-up garage. Inside the garage, they wired two powerful bombs into the chassis of the hired car.
Imad Mugniyah's relationship with Osama bin Laden began in the early 1990s, when al Qaeda's CEO was living in Sudan. Bin Laden's benefactor at the time was a charismatic Sunni Islamist ideologue named Hassan al-Turabi.
In 1989, Turabi, along with General Omar al-Bashir, now president of Sudan, orchestrated a coup in which Sudan's regime was overthrown. In its place, Bashir and Turabi installed their own National Islamic Front (NIF) party.
From the first, the NIF had radical designs for the world. The differences between Sunnis and Shiites were not insurmountable in Turabi's eyes; on multiple occasions he dismissed the importance of any theological disagreements. Instead, Turabi envisioned a grand, Manichean clash of civilizations in which the Muslim world stood united against its common Western foes, especially America.
In a few short years, Turabi's Sudan became a hub for international terrorists of all stripes. A who's who of terrorists set up shop. And Turabi welcomed the leading state sponsors of terrorism as well. Scores of Iraqi and Iranian intelligence officers relocated to Sudan, and Turabi made sure they mingled with his other imported terrorists.
6 countries talk peace while preparing for war
Despite all this peace-talk, something else, quite momentous and hardly noticed, is underway in the region. The real money in Northeast Asia is going elsewhere. While in the news sunshine prevails, in the shadows an already massive regional arms race is threatening to shift into overdrive.
Since the dawn of the 21st century, 5 of the 6 countries involved in the Six Party Talks have increased their military spending by 50% or more. The 6th, Japan, has maintained a steady, if sizeable military budget while nonetheless aspiring to keep pace.
Every country in the region is now eagerly investing staggering amounts of money in new weapons systems and new offensive capabilities.
Chinese authorities are scrambling to ensure food supplies and stem rising inflation as the country digs out after bitter winter storms that damaged crops and left millions in the cold and dark.
China's worst winter weather in half a century killed at least 107 and caused direct economic damage estimated at $15.4 billion, as ice and snow storms destroyed homes and caused power outages that left whole cities in the dark for days.
Europe is paying more attention to both the potential and the problems of Africa. Deutsche Welle spoke with German Foreign Undersecretary Georg Boomgaarden about 2 nations with troubled pasts: Uganda and Rwanda.
Djibouti faces significant challenges as it seeks to parlay short-term gains into long-term stability in a region wracked by conflict. The president faces little obvious pressure either domestically or from key allies the US and France, as the US seeks to cement its expanded military presence in the strategically important Horn of Africa state.
The leader of the Sudanese opposition Popular Congress Party, Sheikh Hassan Al-Turabi, who is Sudan's chief Islamist ideologue as well as an influential former parliamentary speaker, was quoted as stating that he was "convinced" that the "CIA" was involved in Darfur, and, more explicitly, that "the Americans are only interested in [Darfur's] oil."
The secretary-general of Sudan's ruling National Congress Party said that "the West wants to see Darfur divided. This is the scheme adopted by Western foreign policy. The Americans cannot accept the fact that Sudan has large and very much unexploited oil reserves while it is not bowing to the will of Washington."
An editorial in the Egyptian Al-Ahram Weekly stated: "The suspicion in the Arab world is that America's eagerness to intervene in Darfur is an American conspiracy to gain control of Sudanese oil."
Another article on Darfur, in the Al-Ahram Weekly, discussed claims that what is really happening in Darfur is "part of America's strategy to lay its hands on Sudanese oil," and, furthermore, that "the imposition of American sanctions against Sudan should be viewed in the context of the increasingly fierce competition between the US and China for control of Africa's oil wealth..."
African Union countries have agreed to create an energy cooperation body, which will be called the African Energy Commission (AFREC). The decision was made today after a 3-day meeting on energy cooperation. According to the participants, OPEC countries Algeria, Angola, Libya and Nigeria were among the founders of AFREC, which would be the energy arm of the African Union.
President Bush insisted his administration is "plenty active" in the turmoil now roiling nearly every corner of Africa, but said his trip to the continent that began Saturday is focused more on its successes than its conflicts.
The Russian ruble could be used as a payment instrument for deals on an Iranian oil exchange, Iran's ambassador to Moscow said. "Possibly in the future, we'll be able to use the ruble, Russia's national currency, in our operations."
Iran's Army Commander has called on the nation's Ground Force commanders to be more vigilant and wary of any threat against the country. He said that "today, our enemy has stationed its highly advanced military equipment and personnel near us. Despite having many outposts and troops, the global arrogance has become enmeshed in the region and can't get out of its quagmire."
Here it goes: The impossible ultimatum!...
The US has demanded that Iran confess to trying to make atomic weapons, suggesting that anything short of that would doom an IAEA probe of Tehran's nuclear past. The call by the chief US delegate to the IAEA, appeared to set the bar insurmountably high for the investigation by the UN agency's chief -- who has only about a week left before he reports on the probe's progress.
If his probe is deemed unsatisfactory, the board, through a new resolution "has to report to the Security Council that the agency has done all that it can do, and that it cannot guarantee for the peaceful nature of Iran's nuclear program," the diplomat said.
Russia's Defence Ministry said a US plan to shoot down an ailing spy satellite could be used as a cover to test a new space weapon. The ministry said there was insufficient proof that Washington's decision to fire a missile at the disabled satellite was to prevent a potentially deadly leak of toxic gas as it re-entered Earth's atmosphere.
"In our opinion, the decision to destroy the US satellite is not as harmless as it is being presented. Under cover of discussions about the danger posed by the satellite, preparation is going ahead for tests of an anti-satellite weapon. Such tests mean in essence the creation of a new strategic weapon."
According to the DSB Task Force Report, on August 29th, 2007, a pylon – carrying 6 cruise missiles, each armed with nuclear warhead – was without authorization removed from a nuclear weapons stockpile storage site at Minot AFB, transported without authorization – and mated without authorization – to a B-52 bomber.
The nuke laden B-52 then sat, improperly, unguarded overnight, and was then, without authorization, allowed to take off the following morning, make an unauthorized flight to Barksdale AFB, to make an unauthorized landing, and then sit, unguarded, until alert Barkdale personnel discovered the 6 nukes, just sitting there on their tarmac.
For more than 36 hours no one in the US nuclear weapon command-and-control system knew where those nukes were, or in whose possession. Not to worry. The Task Force seems to conclude that it was a paperwork problem.
The unsolved mysteries of the War Party's behind-the-scenes machinations are waiting to be revealed – but the "mainstream" media isn't interested. These and other important stories are being ignored by America's so-called journalists – like their government masters, they'd much rather probe baseball players than lay bare the sleaze bubbling up in our nation's capital.
Perhaps if Saddam Hussein had been accused of injecting HGH instead of hiding WMD, Congress would have stepped up to the plate, so to speak, and dug deep into the truth of the matter. Henry Waxman, as well meaning as he is, sits at the head of a legislative process which has lost touch with reality and purpose.
President Eisenhower famously referred to a "military-industrial complex". A better term, however, is perhaps an "Iron Triangle" whose 3 corners are the Pentagon, arms manufacturers, and Congress. All 3 are locked together by a common vested interest.
Leading Republicans believe they can trounce Barack Obama in the presidential election by tarring him as a shady Chicago socialist. They are increasingly confident that his campaign could collapse by the time their attack machine has finished with him.
Obama has the voting record of a "hard-left" socialist from his time in the Illinois state legislature to the US Senate. He was recently judged by the nonpartisan National Journal to have the most liberal voting record in 2007 of any senator.
To the consternation of news bureaus, political consulting firms and has-been politicians, the Wall Street Journal's poll last month shows that America is hostile to an independent presidential candidacy by Michael Bloomberg.
Yet, despite the unprecedented enthusiasm for the major parties' 2008 presidential contenders, the media and political gatekeepers keep floating the possibility of Bloomberg's candidacy, showing just how much change frightens the status quo.
Bloomberg is an icon of Manhattan's effete aristocracy and the caretaker mayor of a city that is an embarrassing spectacle of economic inequality. The elite are desperate for a stooge, and in Bloomberg, they've found one.
US bishops are telling the government that its immigration laws are hypocritical because they do not protect the rights of immigrant workers. "As a democratic and free nation protective of human rights, we cannot have it both ways. Congress must mend a broken system and show the courage to enact comprehensive immigration reform."
The religion of Holocaustism...
President Sarkozy, facing a tide of criticism over his call for schoolchildren to "adopt" Jewish child victims of the Holocaust, hit back saying France had to raise children "with open eyes". In a speech praising faith that also drew fire from secularists, Sarkozy told France's Jewish community that every 10-year-old schoolchild should be "entrusted with the memory of a French child victim of the Holocaust".
Was England ever on the verge of becoming an Islamic state? In 1215 King John was forced to accept the Magna Carta, that touchstone of English liberties. But according to one medieval chronicler, only 2 years previously he was toying with passing the country over to Sharia.
This is a drinking nation. Binge-drinking is a national "culture", and no rite of passage can be marked in these islands without bottles.
[WAR: "Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine and champions at mixing drinks..." (Isa 5:22).]
US wheat soared up to 5% on Thursday as exports fueled a rebound in the wheat market. "Millers and bakers say the supply situation is getting so tight they want to restrict exports."
Corn and soybeans soared 3% and soyoil hit a record high as China scrambled to garner food supplies after holiday and one of the harshest winters ever that harmed the rapeseed crop. "World vegoil prices are on fire."
Dollar sales by Japanese individual investors on the Tokyo Financial Exchange rose to a record high on speculation the US economy will suffer a recession. Japanese investors have $14.2 trillion in financial assets.
Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke has signalled another round of rate cuts as an "insurance" policy to head off an economic recession in the US economy, saying inflation is no longer the main concern.
Bernanke said the sub-prime mortgage market had suffered a "virtual shutdown" over the past 6 months, leading to a record surge in property foreclosures. "Banks have become more restrictive in their lending to firms and households. Further cuts in homebuilding and in related activities are likely."
The US strategist for Capital Economics, said the Fed's willingness to disregard 4% inflation showed how dangerous matters had become. "In a worst-case scenario, we could see a pernicious spiral developing as falling house prices force lenders to tighten credit conditions further, thereby putting even more downward pressure on prices. The Fed needs to take bold action to prevent that sort of catastrophe."
A senior US Treasury Department official warned that imposing curbs on foreign investors could backfire and end up hurting America's ability to compete. Congress is considering legislation that would force sovereign wealth funds to disclose more about the purposes of their US investments.
Today, we're witnessing another kind of contagion, not so much across countries as across markets. Troubles that began a little over a year ago in an obscure corner of the financial system have spread to corporate bonds, auto loans, credit cards and now, the latest casualty, student loans.
Why has a crisis that began with loans to a limited group of home buyers ended up disrupting so much of the financial system? Because, ultimately, it's a crisis of faith.
More important, however, is the way the ever-widening financial crisis has shaken investors' faith in the whole system. People no longer trust assurances that fancy financial instruments will function the way they're supposed to. And loss of trust can be a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Needless to say, all of this is bad for the economy. I like to think of what's happening as a sort of minor-key reprise of the banking crisis that swept America in 1930 and 1931. One simple measure of the seriousness of the credit problem is this: although the Federal Reserve has sharply cut the interest rate it controls over the past few weeks, the borrowing costs facing many companies and households have actually gone up.
And the financial contagion is still spreading. What market is next?
The following is an interview with Hamid Varzi an economist and banker based in Tehran about the US economic crisis.
"The US is totally dependent on China's goodwill. If the US were to ban all imports from China tomorrow morning the US economy would suffer a heart attack as it would have to import those same goods more expensively from elsewhere. In retaliation, the Chinese would sell their surplus Dollar mountain and precipitate a global economic depression.
"The emerging economies would be better able to withstand such an Armageddon scenario because they are accustomed to hardship, while decadent US consumers are already bankrupt despite an environment of extended global economic growth. The US would probably suffer riots, internal conflict and starvation for the first time in 80 years."
The political showdown over the future of Pemex, the Mexican government's crucial oil monopoly, appears to loom at last. At stake is the viability of Mexico's petroleum industry, which ranks as the 3rd-largest source of imported US oil and supplies nearly 40% of the Mexican government's budget.
Pemex — which exports about 1.4 million barrels of crude a day to the US, most of it through Houston and its environs — has acknowledged that its oil production and reserves are dropping fast.
Many across the political spectrum here agree something must be done, and quickly, to reverse the tide, but the showdown isn't expected to come for several months. The argument involves whether to invite in American and other foreign oil companies, and on what terms to do so.
The underlying premise of macroeconomics is that we can trust the abilities of Congressmen to pass legislation which tenured bureaucrats can and will administer fairly, coherently, and safely, so that the free market's allocation principle of "high bid wins" cannot become the governing principle of economic distribution.
When you think "macroeconomics," think, "I'm from the government, and I'm here to help you."
Away from these areas of direct combat, however, another strategic dilemma faced by the architects of the war on terror is becoming increasingly visible. This involves developments in asymmetric warfare - the ability of the weak to take up arms against the strong.
The ability of extreme movements to undertake mass casualty attacks is already formidable; so also is their developing capacity to strike at the vulnerable underpinnings of advanced industrial economies - in short, economic targeting.
The application of economic targeting by al-Qaida and its affiliates is not new; many of the more nationalist Iraqi insurgents have also caused great devastation to oil and service installations in their operations since 2004.
What is happening now, however, seems to be that this type of activity is becoming more of a focus of militant groups' thinking, including in countries minimally if at all connected with the US-led war on terror.
It may be too early to call this a global trend, but the example of earlier periods and contexts of armed insurgency or guerrilla warfare suggests that "economic warfare" could become a potent weapon in the armory of a new generation of militants.
2008 may witness the beginning of another phase in what is proving to be another - and this time global - "long war."
Saturn's moon Titan has hundreds of times more liquid hydrocarbons than all the known oil and natural gas reserves on Earth, according to a team of Johns Hopkins University scientists, adding to evidence that oil is not biological in origin. "Several hundred lakes or seas have been discovered, of which dozens are estimated to contain more hydrocarbon liquid than the entire known oil and gas reserves on Earth."
Anytime that a hard-nosed analysis is put forth of who our rulers are, of how their political and economic interests interlock, it is invariably denounced by Establishment liberals and conservatives (and even by many libertarians) as a "conspiracy theory of history," "paranoid," "economic determinist," and even "Marxist."
Far from being a paranoid or a determinist, the conspiracy analyst is a praxeologist; that is, he believes that people act purposively, that they make conscious choices to employ means in order to arrive at goals.
There are, of course, good conspiracy analysts and bad conspiracy analysts, just as there are good and bad historians or practitioners of any discipline.
I submit that the naïfs who stubbornly refuse to examine the interplay of political and economic interest in government are tossing away an essential tool for analyzing the world in which we live.
[WAR: "Hide me from the conspiracy of the wicked, from that noisy crowd of evildoers." (Psa 64:2)
"There is a conspiracy among the people of Judah and those who live in Jerusalem." (Jer 11:9) "There is a conspiracy of her princes within her like a roaring lion tearing its prey; they devour people, take treasures and precious things." (Eze 22:25)
But also: "Do not call conspiracy everything that these people call conspiracy; do not fear what they fear, and do not dread it." (Isa 8:12)
Scientists are no further forward in developing a vaccine against HIV after more than 20 years of research, a Nobel Prize-winning biologist has said. HIV had evolved a way to protect itself from the human immune system, he said.
"This is a huge challenge because to control HIV immunologically the scientific community has to beat out nature, do something that nature, with its advantage of 4 billion years of evolution, has not been able to do. I believe that HIV has found ways to totally fool the immune system. So we have to do one better than nature."
[WAR: Nobody in this world has ever died of HIV or AIDS, so why try to develop a vaccine for a retro-virus (dead cell debris) that is nothing more than a genetic marker? Forgetting the political, geo-political, population control, military, economic, and religious side of the AIDS issue, the scientists start on the wrong road to begin with -- evolution, and the wrong assumption that flies attract garbage.
And my favorite: The Great AIDS Hoax ("This booklet shows that AIDS is a lot of old deficiency diseases lumped together under one name. AIDS is not caused by viruses; AIDS is caused by drugs, medicines, dietary and other poisons. Set yourself free of the idea that AIDS is a viral or sexually transmitted epidemic, and learn that the real epidemic is medical-pharmacological ignorance and profiteering."). On Amazon: Front/back/TOC/excerpt.]
COG government!...
People in crowds behave just like sheep, scientists claim, by blindly following 1 or 2 people who seem to know where they are going.
The results of experiments show that it takes a minority of just 5% of what they called "informed individuals" to influence the direction of a crowd of a minimum of 200 people. The remaining herd of 95% follow without realising it.
The work follows another study that showed that most of us are happy to play follow-my-leader, even if we are trailing after someone who does not really know where they are going. "Even more striking, that study found that even when we are shown a faster route, we still prefer to stick with the old one and tell others to take the long road too."
[WAR: "My people have been lost sheep; their shepherds have led them astray and caused them to roam on the mountains." (Jer 50:6). "The prophets prophesy lies, the priests rule by their own authority, and my people love it this way." (Jer 5:31).]
A butterfly! Mid-February! Is that the earliest butterfly I have ever seen? If you keep information, you create patterns: and as the year turns, we see quite clearly that it turns earlier than before.
Norfolk Wildlife Trust has asked its members to report first sightings. NWT records show that the orange-tip butterfly appears 2 weeks earlier than it did 30 years ago. Oak trees are appearing in full leaf 3 weeks earlier than they did 50 years back. Swallows turn up 10 days earlier than they did 30 years ago.
[WAR: "The stork in the heavens knows her appointed times; and the dove and the swallow and the crane observe the time of their coming/migration; but my people know not the law of YAHWEH." (Jer 8:7).
So HOW could His people not know the law? We have it right there in black-and-white -- and have multiple versions/translations of it. Just read the next verse for the answer: "How can you say, 'We are wise, for we have the law of YAHWEH,' when actually the lying pen of the scribes has handled it falsely?" (v.8).
So WHAT part of the law has been handled falsely? "The Earth is also defiled under its inhabitants, because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant." (Isa 24:5).
And WHICH ordinance has been changed? "This is a day you are to commemorate; for the generations to come you shall celebrate it as a festival to YAHWEH -- a lasting ordinance. ... Celebrate the Feast of Unleavened Bread, because it was on this very day that I brought your divisions out of Egypt. Celebrate this day as a lasting ordinance for the generations to come. ... You must keep this ordinance at the appointed time year after year." (Exo 12:14,17 / 13:10)
There is only one conclusion that can be reached: His people do not know exactly WHEN to keep the Sabbath DAY and the annual holy DAYS (especially Passover/DUB) that are designated in the law! It's not our "attitude", or our understanding of the meaning of the holy days -- it's the timing!!
This is WHY He says: "New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations -- I cannot bear your evil assemblies. Your New Moon festivals and your appointed feasts my soul hates. They have become a burden to me; I am weary of bearing them." (Isa 1:13,14) And also: "I hate, I despise your religious feasts; I cannot stand your assemblies." (Amos 5:21)]
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