Reading between the lines, and thinking outside the box . . .
Pope Benedict XVI took President Bush on a rare stroll through the lush grounds of the Vatican Gardens today, stopping at a grotto where the pontiff prays daily. They talked about relations between the US and Europe, globalization, the world food crisis and international trade, among other topics, the Vatican said.
(And: Vatican communique)
Far from being pro-Hitler, the wartime pope Pius XII used to get up in the middle of the night and perform exorcisms on the German dictator, believing him to be possessed by the devil.
Bavarians celebrate the 850th anniversary of Munich today with a party that will last into the weekend and with special events all summer.
Christian Ude, the city's mayor, and plenty of prominent Bavarians will show up for the official kickoff Friday evening, but the celebrations will go late into early hours of June 14, the day in 1158 that is considered the date Munich was actually founded.
(Wiki: Munich)
[WAR: "Where now is the lions' den, the place where they fed their young, where the lion and lioness went, and the cubs, with nothing to fear?" (Nahum 2:11) Why, they went to the city that Henry "the Lion" founded -- modern-day Nineveh!]
Germany has so far been spared a bloody Islamist terror attack. But it only took 2 planned attacks in Germany to persuade a majority of the population to support a massive dismantling of civil rights.
President Bush took a drubbing in the German media this week, but a handful of establishment figures and newspapers say the criticism wasn't entirely fair. After all, they argue, if the US hadn't gone to war, Berlin and Brussels might still be dealing with Saddam and the Taliban.
Ireland has voted No to the Lisbon Treaty, plunging the European Union into a new crisis ... with far-reaching consequences for the entire bloc. It means that 3 million voters have effectively decided the fate of a bloc of almost 500 million people.
(And: "In uncharted territory")
(And: "NO" sparks EU crisis)
(And: EU treaty in peril)
(And: Likely consequences)
(And: Brussels gloomy)
(And: Italy: A serious blow)
(And: Treaty to be rammed through?)
(And: Irish NO a YES for democracy)
The Irish no to the EU's Lisbon Treaty today has cast uncertainty over the German ratification process. While both houses of the German parliament have passed the legislation ratifying the treaty, President Koehler has yet to sign it.
But Peter Gauweiler, a member of the Bundestag for Bavaria's Christian Social Union, applied to the Constitutional Court to have the treaty ruled unconstitutional. He cited objections that the treaty impinges on German sovereignty, in particular on the rights of German citizens to representation by members of the German parliament.
President Bush is urging Europe to work with the US on matters that extend beyond their trans-Atlantic ties, including securing peace in the Middle East, fighting radical Islamic terrorists and keeping Iran in check. "Instead of dwelling on our differences, we are increasingly united in our interests and ideals."
Russia attempts to destabilize situation in Georgia to take control over the Baku-Ceyhan pipeline, passing via Georgia, says former adviser for US president in Jimmy Carter's administration, famous US political scientist Zbignev Bzhezinski.
In a move designed to pressure Kadima into replacing Ehud Olmert as prime minister, the Labor Party will support a bill by Likud to dissolve the Knesset, Labor Party leaders say.
Israel today announced its 2nd settlement project in occupied east Jerusalem in a month, enraging Palestinians just ahead of a US visit aimed at rescuing the stalemated peace process.
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat expressed outrage at the decision. "We firmly condemn this project which reveals the Israeli government's intention to destroy peace. The international community must make Israel stop its settlement activity if it wants to give peace negotiations a chance."
(And: Outrage over housing plan)
Some Pakistani officials, including provincial chief Haider Khan Hoti, are calling for "reconsideration" of US-Pakistani relations after an ill-fated US airstrike allegedly killed 11 Pakistani government troops. Meanwhile, US defense officials continue to straddle the fence – caught in the no man's land between admission and denial of the allegations.
Arab and Western nations called on Eritrea Thursday to withdraw its troops from the border with Djibouti following clashes that killed at least 6 Djiboutian soldiers and wounded over 50 others.
Officials said the first fighting for a decade between the Horn of Africa neighbors stopped late Wednesday. Troops from both sides had exchanged fire since Tuesday along a part of their border that overlooks strategic shipping lanes in the Red Sea.
Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman slams Bush's recent remarks on military action against Iran, branding the comments 'irresponsible'. "Bush's unilateral and arrogant approach to the lawful rights of the great Iranian nation will not change the realities of Iran's peaceful nuclear activities. Retiring Bush can't compensate for his past mistakes through making groundless allegations."
World powers will on Saturday promise Iran economic benefits if it halts sensitive nuclear work, but there is little sign of any breakthrough soon. A diplomat in Tehran said he believed that offering Iran security guarantees, an idea floated by Russia, could help end the deadlock: "This is the point that really matters to Iran. As long as they don't feel safe they will not concede."
(No!: Will more sanctions work?)
With 223 days left in his presidency, George W. Bush laid more flagstones along a path to war on Iran. There was the usual declaration that "all options are on the table" – and, just as ominously, much talk of diplomacy.
Three times on Wednesday, the AP reports, Bush "called a diplomatic solution 'my first choice,' implying there are others. He said 'we'll give diplomacy a chance to work,' meaning it might not." That's how Bush talks when he's grooving along in his Orwellian comfort zone, eager to order a military attack.
Now, as agenda-setting for an air attack on Iran moves into higher gear, the mainline US news media – with the New York Times playing its influential part – are engaged in coverage that does little more than provide stenographic services for the Bush administration.
(And: Rice and Iran's "nukes")
America's Dangerous Devotion to Executive Power
American liberty is dying. For years the process has been slow strangulation, as successive Congresses and presidents, irrespective of party, expanded government power. Alas, both parties have combined to give the growth of government authority a dangerous twist: the aggrandizement of the executive.
The Republican worship of unilateral executive power has reached its apotheosis in the Bush administration. Taken seriously, President Bush claims to have the right to ignore the Constitution at home for as long as we are at war – which means forever, since the "war on terrorism" has no obvious endpoint and the battlefield is the entire world, including the US.
Admittedly, President Bush so far has not fully exercised these extraordinary powers, which logically include the authority to disband the Supreme Court and prorogue Congress for interfering with his attempt to protect America from terrorism.
The US Supreme Court ruled 5-4 Thursday that prisoners held as "enemy combatants" at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba can immediately file habeas corpus petitions in US district courts challenging the legality of their confinement. Kennedy's opinion is a rebuke to a cornerstone of the Bush administration's so-called "global war on terror."
(And: Death blow to Gitmo)
German press
For the 3rd time in a row, the US Supreme Court has rapped the Bush administration on the knuckles for its treatment of Guantanamo inmates. Perhaps it is time to impeach President Bush, says one German paper.
A blogger who earlier cited the "unlikely" but still circulating rumor Barack Obama was born not within the US, but elsewhere, possibly Kenya, now says he's satisfied the senator was born in Hawaii.
Ron Paul's presidential campaign, a pugnacious, ideological crusade against big government and interventionist leanings in the Republican party, will officially end Thursday at a rally outside the Texas GOP's convention. Paul told supporters back in March, in a video posted on his Web site, that he was "winding down" his campaign and planning a new phase to what he and fans call their "revolution."
A United Nations report says Britain should abolish its monarchy. The UN Human Rights Council said the UK must "consider holding a referendum on the desirability or otherwise of a written constitution, preferably republican".
The Bank for International Settlements, the organisation that fosters cooperation between central banks, has warned that the credit crisis could lead world economies into a crash on a scale not seen since the 1930s.
In its latest quarterly report, the body points out that the Great Depression of the 1930s was not foreseen and that commentators on the financial turmoil, instigated by the US sub-prime mortgage crisis, may not have grasped the level of exposure that lies at its heart.
The Federal Reserve says the economy remained "generally weak" heading into summer as rising costs for energy and food pounded consumers and forced some companies to push their own prices higher.
The number of US homeowners swept up in the housing crisis rose further last month, with foreclosure filings up nearly 50% compared with a year earlier.
(Cartoon: It's a fixer-upper)
(Cartoons: Facing foreclosure)
Companies traditionally get loans from banks, but with so many lenders stretched and with credit so tight these days, businesses are turning to what might seem like an unlikely source for cash: hedge funds.
As banks retrench, hedge funds increasingly are offering loans to companies, usually at interest rates that are far higher than those that banks charge. Unlike banks, which raise money from depositors, hedge funds are not regulated.
Ordinary Germans have begun to reject euro bank notes with serial numbers from Italy, Spain, Greece and Portugal, raising concerns that public support for monetary union may be waning in the eurozone's anchor country.
Germany's Handelsblatt newspaper says bankers have detected a curious pattern where customers are withdrawing cash directly from branches, screening the notes to determine the origin of issue. They ask for paper from the southern states to be exchanged for German notes. People clearly suspect that southern notes may lose value in a crisis, or if the eurozone breaks apart.
German citizens were never given a vote on the abolition of the D-Mark, which had become a symbol of Germany's rebirth after the war. Many have kept a stash of D-Marks hidden in mattresses to this day. A recent poll showed that 59% of Germany now have serious doubts about the euro.
(Yes!: Will the mark return?)
Central banks across much of Asia, Latin America, and Eastern Europe will soon have to jam on the breaks or risk a serious crisis as inflation spirals into the danger zone. As the stark reality becomes ever clearer, this year's correction in emerging market bourses and bond markets has now accelerted into a full-fledged rout.
After investing in high-tech stocks and real estate loans for years, legions of speculators have now discovered commodities like oil and gas, wheat and rice. Their billions are pushing prices up to astronomical levels -- with serious consequences for ordinary people's quality of life and the global economy.
In Washington, financial speculators have a fat target on their backs. They are being blamed for high gasoline prices, soaring grocery bills and volatile commodity markets, and lawmakers are lashing out at market regulators for not cracking down on them more vigorously.
With tempers rising along with food and fuel prices, some market scholars are concerned that speculation, the legal pursuit of market profits, is becoming a synonym for manipulation - secret and collusive trading activity aimed at deliberately moving prices to produce illegal profits.
It's time to ask whether the U.S. military should have anything to do with American energy security.
If you thought things were bad, with a barrel of crude oil at $136 and the oil heartlands of our planet verging on chaos, don't be surprised, but you may still have something to look forward to. Within 18 months, that same barrel could be selling for a nifty $250.
Vice President Dick Cheney's office acknowledged on Thursday that he was mistaken when he asserted that China, at Cuba's behest, is drilling for oil in waters 60 miles from the Florida coast. Congressional Democrats pounced on the vice president's remarks and were backed up by independent energy experts, who called the assertion hyperbole at best and a falsehood at worst.
Exxon Mobil is getting out of the retail gasoline business, a market where profits have gotten tougher because of high crude oil prices. The world's largest publicly traded oil company said Thursday it will sell its 820-company owned stations and another 1,400 outlets operated by dealers to gasoline distributors across the US However, motorists will continue to see Exxon and Mobil stations throughout the country.
The International Energy Agency says Russia has turned into the biggest crude oil producer, a title traditionally belonged to Saudi Arabia. The IEA declared on Tuesday that Russia has been the biggest crude oil producer in the 1st quarter of 2008, extracting 9.5 million barrels per day.
Across Asia, sharp rises in fuel prices continued to stoke public anger.
It is the new face of hunger. A perfect storm of food scarcity, global warming, rocketing oil prices and the world population explosion is plunging humanity into the biggest crisis of the 21st century by pushing up food prices and spreading hunger and poverty from rural areas into cities.
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[Latest edition of The Religion WAR]
For all of us in the northern hemisphere, the earliest sunrises of the year are happening now, despite the fact that the solstice is still a week away. The exact date of earliest sunrise varies with latitude.
At 40 degrees north latitude, the earliest sunrise of the year will happen tomorrow. For that same latitude, the latest sunset of the year will fall on June 27. This is in spite of the fact that the longest day of the year (in terms of daylight) comes on the June 20th summer solstice.
So it is for other northern hemisphere latitudes. The dates of earliest sunrise and latest sunset do not coincide exactly with the solstice.
Then Moses said to the people, "Prepare yourselves for the 3rd day. Abstain from sexual relations." (Exo 19:15)
[WAR: Moses did not say this on the day he started consecrating the people (2 days ago), but AFTER this was done and the people had washed their clothes.
We've always assumed that the 2 days of consecration was included in this 3-day time period -- but it doesn't! It's right there in black 'n white: "After Moses had gone down the mountain to the people, he consecrated them (today and tomorrow), and they washed their clothes. THEN he said to the people: 'Prepare yourselves for the 3rd day [from today].'"
And 3 days from today is Pentecost -- when the Law was given on Sinai, and the Spirit was given in Jerusalem. It will also be the day when the 1st resurrection (being "born again") will take place, as well as The Wedding ... in heaven, with The Father giving the Bride away.]
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