Reading between the lines, and thinking outside the box . . .
Meretrix meretricis vino...
The Vatican's Secretary of State, Cardinal Bertone, confirmed today that Pope Benedict XVI is about to finish his Encyclical on social issues.
"Yes, the Pope is working on a social encyclical, which will have, I believe, a significant impact on the great social and economic problems in the contemporary world. The encyclical will focus on international social problems, with special attention to developing countries."
Bertone gave no clue as to when the document will be released, but unnamed sources from the Vatican said the 3rd encyclical of Pope Benedict would be signed on the feast of St. Joseph (March 19th) and released during Easter.
[WAR: The Whore is producing a new bottle of wine for the nations to drink. The Catholic Church's social teachings are very good, like a good wine -- but "in the end it bites like a snake and poisons like a viper." (Prov 23:32).
"Babylon the Great, which made all the nations drink the maddening wine of her adulteries ... With her the kings of the earth committed adultery and the inhabitants of the earth were intoxicated with the wine of her adulteries ... For all the nations have drunk the maddening wine of her adulteries." (Rev 14:8 / 17:2 / 18:3)]
The apostolic nuncio in the Holy Land says that "progress is being made" in negotiations toward a final diplomatic accord between Israel and the Holy See.
Vatican diplomats have expressed mounting impatience at the lack of progress in talks leading to an economic-juridical understanding that would guarantee the rights of Church institutions in Israel.
Such an agreement was promised in the original "fundamental accord" that was struck in 1993, leading to Vatican recognition of Israel and the establishment of full diplomatic relations.
Spring is arriving early in Germany this year, as evidenced by daffodils caught blooming in the shadow of Berlin's TV Tower. The unseasonably warm weather is supposed to hang over Germany's capital city until the end of the week.
Spiegel Online announces a new partnership with the journal of the German Council of Foreign Relations to supplement its own opinion-shaping coverage of international issues with uniquely European perspectives.
We believe the partnership will help deepen Spiegel Online's role as the leading Web site in continental Europe for independent German and European perspectives on crucial global issues. IP-Global Edition frequently includes writings by some of Germany's and Europe's top thinkers on global policy.
[Europress] [Russopress]
In a move which risks European Union efforts for a common visa policy, several member states have said they were ready to break ranks and sign bilateral deals with the US.
Germany said today it would move 400 extra soldiers to Kosovo in the next few days, but described it as a routine, month-long redeployment to replace withdrawing Italians. The German contingent total is to briefly rise to 2,700, exceeding that of Italy, currently the main peacekeeper nation in the Balkan state.
Kosovo is a gangster state governed by thugs with ties to Albanian drug trafficking syndicates and al-Qaeda. In Kosovo, PM Hashim Thaci's KLA served as the militarized vanguard for the Albanian mafia whose "15 Families" control virtually every facet of the Balkan heroin trade.
Throughout its Balkan operations the CIA made liberal use of these preexisting narcotics networks to arm the KLA and provide them with targets. The rest is history, as they say.
Kosovo's declaration of independence threatens to inflame relations between former constituent nations of the Soviet Union. A number of frozen conflicts from the 1990s could once again ignite, resulting in military action with unforeseen consequences.
The efforts of the great powers to strengthen their influence on the territories of the former USSR, and the striving of Russia to recoup some of its lost positions, threaten new and bloody conflicts.
Israeli leaders are warning of an imminent conflagration in Gaza after Palestinian militants aimed rockets at the southern city of Ashkelon. The deputy defence minister said the stepped-up rocket fire would trigger what he called a "bigger holocaust" in the Hamas-controlled coastal strip.
Turkey's military operation in northern Iraq against Kurdish separatists could finish in as short a time as one day or take up to year, Turkey's Chief of General Staff said.
(And: Turkey withdraws some troops)
A ceremony to mark Germany's handover to Italy of its command of the UN naval mission patrolling the Lebanese coast was under way on board a German frigate in the area today. Germans have been questioning the purpose of the mission aimed an stopping illegal arms supplies from reaching Lebanon after the conflict ended.
The US is sending a warship to the Middle East as tensions with Syria get worse. A US official confirms that the warship USS Cole will patrol off the coast of Lebanon. The Cole is sailing to the region from Malta. It's a not-too-subtle show of US force in the region as international frustration mounts over a long political deadlock in tiny, weak Lebanon.
After 6 years of US-led military support and billions of pounds in aid, security in Afghanistan is "deteriorating" and President Karzai's government controls less than a third of the country, America's top intelligence official has admitted.
(And: NATO credibility at stake)
The British military decided today to pull Prince Harry "immediately" out of Afghanistan after news of his deployment leaked out in the media, the Ministry of Defence said.
The 23-year-old prince was posted in mid-December to southern Afghanistan under a cloak of secrecy following an unusual agreement reached between the media and the army. But the arrangement collapsed after news was leaked on the Drudge Report.
(And: Secret of Widow-67
(And: World reaction)
The future of Europe's special relationship with Africa is at risk as former colonies react to a blasé, if not hypocritical, European attitude toward the continent. European-style institutions could enter a profound crisis of legitimacy if things do not change soon.
President Bush's leading nemesis in the Middle East, President Ahmadinejad, begins a 2-day state visit to Iraq on Sunday, attempting to highlight Iran's role as the region's major power and upstage Bush and the US military presence.
Western envoys said the UN Security Council would probably vote Saturday to impose a 3rd round of sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program, which Tehran said would be an illegal gesture to be ignored.
Some senior US military commanders are prepared to resign if President Bush orders a military strike against Iran, a new report says. "There are 4 or 5 generals and admirals we know of who would resign if Bush ordered an attack on Iran," The Sunday Times quoted a source with close ties to British intelligence. "There is simply no stomach for it in the Pentagon, and a lot of people question whether such an attack would be effective or even possible."
Skepticism towards the 9/11 official story reached the Australian Supreme Court this week after a lawyer asserted that the attacks were not orchestrated by Osama bin Laden during the trial of an alleged terror group in Melbourne. "To say that this was all orchestrated by Osama bin Laden is a silly thing to do. He's never claimed responsibility for it."
Indeed, Bin Laden's first public statement following the 9/11 attacks was to deny any responsibility for carrying them out. "I have already said that I am not involved in the 11 September attacks in the United States. As a Muslim, I try my best to avoid telling a lie. I had no knowledge of these attacks, nor do I consider the killing of innocent women, children and other humans as an appreciable act. Islam strictly forbids causing harm to innocent women, children and other people. Such a practice is forbidden even in the course of a battle."
What will America look like after -- God forbid -- another 9/11 or the equivalent of the Reichstag fire? Two recent books seek to explore the fragile state of our democracy and they both argue that our essential liberties have started to erode.
[Market data] €
The dollar struck another record low today in Europe as comments from the US Federal reserve chief appeared to instill little confidence.
The euro has reached a record high of $1.50. How much higher can it go and does the high-flying euro threaten jobs? Spiegel Online talks to 3 economists about the enormous risks -- and few benefits -- of the high euro.
Oil prices briefly surpassed $103 a barrel for the first time today as persistent weakness in the US dollar and the prospect of lower interest rates attracted fresh money to the oil market.
The price of crude oil has doubled, from $50 to $100, within months. The increase cannot be attributed to the fundamental data, which have hardly changed. And the looming recession ought to drive the price down. So why is oil getting more expensive?
The country's amber waves of grain were blown to and fro in a wild day of trading Wednesday at the Chicago Board of Trade. Prices for wheat futures swung between record single-day gains and declines.
Poor weather in 2006 hurt yields in the US and abroad, and now the impact of that shortage is rippling through foreign-trade policies, futures markets and grocery store aisles.
Domestic wheat stocks are at their lowest level in 60 years. Global supplies have sunk to a 30-year low. At the same time, growing income levels worldwide have increased demand for wheat. And the weak US dollar makes American wheat more attractive to foreign buyers.
The collapse of US honeybee colonies this year is set to devastate America's multibillion dollar agriculture and food industries. Last year about 750,000 of the 2.5m hives in the US were wiped out in mysterious circumstances, and already this year the American Beekeeping Federation says there is evidence from its members that losses will be even greater this year.
The mysterious and unique aspect of CCD is that the bees are not being found dead near their colonies. They are flying off; just abandoning their life's work, leaving behind the queen and a few younger bees.
A leap year (or intercalary year) is a year containing one or more extra days (or, in the case of lunisolar calendars, an extra month) in order to keep the calendar year synchronised with the [tropical] year. Because seasons and astronomical events do not repeat at an exact number of full days, a calendar which had the same number of days in each year would, over time, drift with respect to the event it was supposed to track.
In the Gregorian calendar, the current standard calendar in most of the world, most years whose division by 4 equals an integer are leap years. The Gregorian calendar was designed to keep the vernal equinox on or close to March 21, so that the date of Easter (celebrated on the Sunday after the 14th day of the Moon that falls on or after 21 March) remains correct with respect to the vernal equinox.
(And: Feb 29th: Leap day)
A team of scientists from Princeton University has devised a new experimental technique that produces some of the best functional images ever taken of the human brainstem, the most primitive area of the brain.
The scientists believe they may be opening the door to inquiries into a region that acts as the staging area for the brain chemicals whose overabundance or absence in other parts of the brain are at the root of many neuropsychiatric disorders.
"For a long time, scientists have tried looking at this area of the brain and have been unsuccessful -- it's just too small. We wanted to try because the brainstem is so important to activities in the rest of the brain."
The MRI device produces 3-dimensional images that show what portions of the brain engage during actions and thought processes. This allows the investigators to correlate physical processes with mental activities with unprecedented precision.
The Princeton group wants to understand how the brain's physical structures give rise to the functions of the mind, a field known as cognitive neuroscience. For years, neuroscientists focused on the brain while psychologists dealt with the mind. The new field combines both.
The moon will be in close alignment with the galactic center in the wee hours tomorrow. Unlike the moon, the sun never aligns with the galactic center.But the sun does cross the galactic equator twice a year.
In fact, a lot of hullaboo is being raised about the winter solstice sun aligning with the galactic equator on December 21, 2012. Yet, the mathematical wizard Jean Meeus claims the event has already passed, with the winter solstice point having aligned with the galactic equator in 1998.
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