Reading between the lines, and thinking outside the box . . .
Benedict XVI has cancelled meetings with 7 world leaders to avoid an encounter with President Ahmadinejad. The Pope was keen to avoid the glare of publicity that would have been triggered by a one-to-one meeting with Ahmadinejad.
The privatization of Germany's railway company has been on the cards for 14 years, but disagreements over how to privatize the company, and if it was even desirable, held up the sell-off. Now Germany's lawmakers have approved a partial privatization.
Germans are experiencing a particularly unpleasant kind of energy crisis. What is really worrying Germans, though, is the fear that this "oil price madness," as Germany's mass-circulation daily Bild calls it, could become a permanent condition.
For economists and consumers alike, all previous calculations are now out the window. Whereas earlier a majority of experts predicted robust growth for 2008, they now see an economy in serious danger.
With 2 weeks to go until the Lisbon Treaty referendum, Irish voters are slowly making their minds up on how to vote. Worryingly for Brussels it is the 'No' campaign that is steadily gaining support, as it plays on fears relating to neutrality, taxation and abortion.
Despite every major political party backing the Yes campaign, support for a No vote is growing daily. Having spent 2 years rebuilding the Treaty of Lisbon from the scrap parts of the defeated European Constitution, the Eurocrats can only watch as a learner driver takes the wheel of their juggernaut and drives it towards the edge of a cliff. Because the treaty must be passed unanimously by all 27 member states, an Irish No vote would kill it.
The fate of the new European constitutional treaty could be determined within 2 weeks as a court case in London over the government's refusal to hold a referendum coincides with a vote in Ireland on the agreement. If the Irish electorate rejects the Lisbon treaty on June 12, it cannot legally come into force, plunging the EU into crisis.
Environmental issues dominate the EU's proceedings throughout the week.
(Op-ed: Enlarging the EU: Chicken or Kiev?)
Today marks the 10th birthday of the European Central Bank. Although seen as one of the most powerful financial organizations in the world, it is unloved by Europeans and frequented criticized by politicians.
Tension is once again rising between Georgia and the breakaway region of Abkhazia, which is supported by Russia but not internationally recognized. Abkhazia's Prime Minister talks to Spiegel Online about why his people don't want war.
Turkey's top prosecutor accused the Turkish prime minister of hiding his true intentions to transform the Turkish Republic's regime into a conservative Islamic republic.
Foreign Ministry officials are growing increasingly concerned at what they see as signs that relations between Syria and European countries are thawing following many months during which the Syrian regime was internationally isolated.
In view of the restart of talks between Israel and Syria, Israeli diplomatic missions in Europe were issued instructions from Jerusalem to ask European capitals to exercise "caution" in their contacts with Damascus, because it has yet to prove the seriousness of its intent regarding to the negotiations.
Prime Minister Olmert heads to Washington on Monday weakened by a major crisis at home that cast a shadow over both his political future and the tenuous US-sponsored Middle East peace talks.
The frontrunner to become Israel's next prime minister, Tzipi Livni, was a Paris agent for Mossad, Israel's overseas intelligence agency, in the early 1980s when it ran a series of missions to kill Palestinian terrorists in European capitals, according to former colleagues.
The Gaza marine gas field lies 25 to 30 kilometers off Gaza's shore, and is estimated to hold 1 trillion cubic feet of gas worth some $4 billion in revenue.
In 2005, at the time of Israel's 'disengagement' from the Gaza Strip, the Palestinians decided to drop plans to sell gas to Israel and talked with Egypt instead. The position changed again when Tony Blair -- Israel's ever-faithful dogsbody and now the Quartet's special envoy to the Middle East -- personally intervened on Israel's behalf.
The founder of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program, Abdul Qadeer Khan, exposed Washington as a liar on Tehran's drive, a top lawmaker says.
In a Friday telephone interview with the Guardian, the Pakistani scientist said he was forced to admit that he had sold nuclear technology to other countries - including Iran, North Korea and Libya. He added that the US-backed Pakistani President Musharraf made him confess to passing nuclear information to foreigners.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates issued a set of thinly veiled warnings to China on Saturday, cautioning that it could risk its share of further gains in Asia's economic prosperity if it bullied its neighbors over natural resources in contested areas like the South China Sea.
Absence of foreshocks and other typical precursors
Some scientists were puzzled by the unusual quiet period of quakes before the 8.0-magnitude earthquake struck southwest China. But others believe there had been precursors, which stood as warnings for a major quake.
Islanders on Phu Quoc, close to the coast of Cambodia, heard a loud bang and saw shards of metal up to 5ft-long raining down on them on Tuesday morning. Villagers in Kampot said they had also heard a loud explosion and found small chunks of metal near the coast.
Germany's Foreign Minister claims President Ahmadinejad's "denial of the Holocaust is unbearable." "His denial of the Holocaust is as unbearable as his questioning of Israel's right to exist." He stressed that defending the existence and security of Israel was a main feature of his country's foreign policy.
(Truth: What is "Holocaust denial"?)
Iran is not trying to acquire nuclear weapons but Tehran should avoid "irritating" its neighbours, Russian PM Putin said Saturday in an interview with French newspaper Le Monde.
"The Iranians are a proud people. They want to enjoy their independence and exercise their legitimate right to civil nuclear power. I am serious. On a legal level, Iran has infringed nothing at the moment. They have the same right to enrichment (of uranium). The paperwork says so. Iran is accused of not displaying all its programmes to the IAEA. This point remains to be resolved...."
"Any attack on Iran would be a foolish move, and would result in painful consequences for the attacker. Iran's response for such a move would cause the attacker to repent," Iran's Defense Minister said in an interview with the Iranian Fars News Agency on Saturday.
An opinion piece by Joschka Fischer, the former German foreign minister, published Saturday in a leading Middle East paper says that Israel is planning to attack Iran over its nuclear program.
He wrote a piece that appeared in the Daily Star, an English-language Lebanese newspaper, arguing that President Bush's recent visit to the Middle East was a precursor to a war on Iran's nuclear program.
"The Middle East is drifting toward a new great confrontation in 2008. Iran must understand that without a diplomatic solution in the coming months, a dangerous military conflict is very likely to erupt. It is high time for serious negotiations to begin."
(And: Petraeus' Iran obsession)
"So knowing what you know," Olbermann inquired, "if Dana Perino starts making noises similar to what you heard from Ari Fleischer in 2002 and other members of the cabinet, you would be suspicious?"
"I would be," McClellan said. "I think that you would need to take the comments seriously and be skeptical."
Shows of force by nations competing to control dwindling energy supplies could trigger conflict in hot spots across the globe.
When powerful states wish to signal their determination to pursue particular vital interests against the wishes of weaker powers or deter a rival from overstepping certain boundaries, they often make a conspicuous show of deploying air, ground or naval forces within shooting range of the recipient of the intended "message."
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin compared the US to a "frightening monster" and urged France to distance itself from its American ally. "How can one be such a shining example of democracy at home and a frightening monster abroad?" Putin said in an interview.
Putin, speaking the day after meeting President Sarkozy, said the US was creating "new Berlin Walls" in Europe by pushing NATO to expand into ex-Soviet states Georgia and Ukraine.
Comes now McClellan, an ordinary guy who has a noble reason for his betrayal, and we all want to hear his story. At long last, the chickens are coming home to roost. Before long the networks will be doing features on the neoconservatives, and the president and reporters that loved them. Next stop, the Hague.
Filmmaker Paul Cross was doing post-production work in Washington, DC when he heard about the "terrorist" attack. He visited the Pentagon crash-site just 5 hours after impact and could plainly see the official story was a lie.
"There was no passenger jet wreckage; the lawn wasn't scorched; lamp posts, fences and construction materials in the path of the jet were untouched. If this was a hoax, then the attack on the World Trade Centre was also a hoax."
2 steps forward, 1 step back
In order to force a new reality upon any targeted populace, the masters of the universe follow a simple strategy – they immediately make things twice as bad as they intend to keep them, only to take 1 step back after a short while, so that the new manufactured reality will be easier to accept. This strategy holds constant from the manipulation of oil prices to the military strategy to rule the world by force.
In order to carry out the Israeli-centric PNAC (Project for a New American Century) terror war plan that they have committed to, Bush and Cheney have doggedly undermined America's national interests at home and all over the world.
Israel has been the primary source for most of the "intelligence" that launched the war on Iraq, the Iranian reactors and hypothetical nuclear weapons, as well as the alleged Syrian reactors.
Israel is behind every military move against Iran that is being brought-up in the press. It was the first to suggest taking out Iranian reactors, the first to recommend a naval blockade of Iran and an embargo on air flights between Iran and Syria and Lebanon. American Zionist Congressional leaders gladly took up the torches lit by Israel, to create Israeli security at America's expense. A Congressional resolution is awaiting passage in the Senate, which demands that our government carry-out these acts of war, both the naval blockade and the air embargo.
Voters in 5 major European countries showed a strong preference for Obama as their favourite candidate, according to a poll published on Friday.
British television is conquering America. It has discovered that we Brits, far from being reserved and polite, are actually rather rude and outspoken. What's more, Americans seem to love it. This is the authentic voice of new Britain. It loves a laugh but can also be vulgar, aggressive, foul-mouthed and bossy (although we prefer to think of ourselves as refreshingly plain-spoken).
Euro zone inflation surged back to a peak 3.6 percent in May as fresh data pointed to an economic slowdown, cementing expectations the European Central Bank would keep interest rates on hold this year.
By slashing interest rates in the face of rising price pressures, has the world's most important central bank sowed the seeds of a new inflationary era? It's an alarming idea, but one gaining currency all the time.
In real terms, American borrowing costs are firmly in negative territory. No wonder the markets are wondering if Ben Bernanke, Fed chairman, has made a grave error.
The worst is over, according to financial luminaries ranging from JP Morgan's Jamie Dimon and Sir Win Bischoff, chairman of Citigroup, to Sir John Gieve, deputy governor of the Bank of England. They are referring, of course, to the credit crisis, rather than to its after-effects on the economy.
Still, not everyone is optimistic that all the bad news is out. The full economic cost of the financial crisis is still unfolding. There is still the possibility that there are more nasty surprises of the sub-prime kind to come - that we are in the eye, rather than at the end, of the financial storm.
As banks look to shore up their balance sheets in the wake of the credit squeeze, Philip Aldrick asks whether it is all short-term trickery
'We are in the midst of the worst financial crisis since the 1930s," warns the eminent financier George Soros in his latest book. It's a rather extreme view, but the man who broke the Bank of England is not alone in his dark funk. At a recent event, one banker laced Soros's sentiment with a little gallows humour, ruefully predicting "10 years of depression followed by a world war".
When markets must climb the wall of worries, setting up suckers to hold the bag, metals cut up worthless paper, credit default swaps now skyrocketing, a witches brew of economy killing debacles, SEC watching Bear Stearns, ruining the reputation of America...
Many Americans allowed themselves to fantasize about large-screen TVs, European vacations and other luxuries when they learned of the federal rebates they'd be getting this spring and early summer. Or maybe — shh, don't tell the president — they'd pay off a credit card or set the rebate aside for a big purchase in the future, notwithstanding Washington's intentions that they pump it immediately into the flagging economy.
How much did the Fed really know?
The Commodity Futures and Trading Commission is investigating trading in oil futures to determine whether the surge in prices to record levels is the result of manipulation or fraud. They might want to take a look at wheat, rice and corn futures while they're at it.
The whole thing is a hoax cooked up by the investment banks and hedge funds who are trying to dig their way out of the trillion dollar mortgage-backed securities mess that they created by turning garbage loans into securities. That scam blew up in their face last August and left them scrounging for handouts from the Federal Reserve.
Now the billions of dollars they're getting from the Fed is being diverted into commodities which is destabilizing the world economy; driving gas prices to the moon and triggering food riots across the planet.
Two of the world's largest energy exchanges have forced traders to deposit significantly more money when investing to curb volatility in energy markets and drive out speculators. The exchanges and related clearing houses have found themselves at the centre of the growing storm over claims that speculators have been behind the recent rise in oil prices to record levels.
Speculation. Manipulation. As politicians, business leaders, and ordinary consumers try to grasp the causes and effects of the historic surge in oil prices, attention turns to dark notions of exploitative financial maneuvering. Are savvy traders cashing in -- or even cornering some portion of the market -- and thereby contributing to the painful runup that's shaking everyone from airlines to commuters at the gas pump?
(Q&A: Oil prices)
Meteorologists are predicting a busy hurricane season this year, and any direct hit on the Gulf of Mexico's extensive oil and gas infrastructure could easily send already sky-high oil prices rocketing past $150 a barrel.
A fevered scramble for control of the world's seabed is going on - mostly in secret - at a little known office of the United Nations in New York.
Bemused officials are watching with a mixture of awe and suspicion as Britain and France stake out legal claims to oil and mineral wealth as far as 350 nautical miles around each of their scattered islands across the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans. Not to be left out, Australia and New Zealand are carving up the Antarctic seas.
All over Europe, the rocketing cost of food and fuel is straining family budgets, stirring unrest and shaking governments. David Blair examines the roots and the impact of a widening crisis.
Politicians across Europe are feeling the heat from this sudden outbreak of a distinctly '70s variety of economic sickness. As a result, the world is about to witness a series of crisis meetings.
In a year of rising food prices and high fuel costs that are creating pressure to produce more ethanol, the country could really use a perfect corn crop. So far, it isn't happening.
And depending on the right mix of sun, heat, rain and cool, it could drive prices up even further. That may mean consumers will be spending even more for groceries like soda, cookies, cake or anything that contains high fructose corn syrup and for any meat that relies on corn as animal feed.
[CFR Opinion Roundup][Newseum][Global Incident Map][Earthweek][Day-Night Map][Tonight's Sky][Moon phase]
[Latest edition of The Religion WAR]
President Chavez said on Saturday that an armed encounter between Venezuelan soldiers and unidentified armed fighters occurred along the Venezuela-Colombia border. He said it was not clear to which group the armed fighters belonged and what they were doing there.
Tonight's sky
The constellation Libra originally was part of Scorpius, but in Roman times was excised to form a star pattern honoring an emperor holding the scales of Justice. The emperor has since fallen by the wayside, leaving only his scales. This addition to the Zodiac (circle of animals) is out of place, since it represents the only inanimate object there.
WAR e-mail format for military: YAHOO! WARriors
WAR fund: PayPal (payable to thedailywarrior@gmail.com)
