Reading between the lines, and thinking outside the box . . .
In Wednesday's general audience, held this morning in the Paul VI Hall, the Pope recalled how the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity began last Sunday, inspired this year by the words of the Prophet Ezekiel: "That they may become one in your hand".
(And: Full text of address)
As part of her efforts to combat the economic crisis, Chancellor Merkel is increasing the state's influence in the market, buying holdings in banks and bailing out individual industries and companies. Is Germany turning into a planned economy?
Germany's constitutional court is preparing for an unusually long hearing on the EU's Lisbon treaty in a process that will help determine the fate of the document across the European Union.
Over 2 days next month the court's judges will discuss whether the treaty breaches Germany's constitution.
The time the court has allotted for the debate is exceptionally long. According to Focus magazine, it only happens once or twice in a decade that the court gives more than 1 day for a hearing.
Although Germany's parliament has ratified the treaty and the president has signed it off, the final step to complete the process – formally handing the papers over in Rome – will remain stalled until the court has decided.
It is, some say, just the beginning: 2009 could become another 1968 - a new age of rebellion.
"It will be caused by the rise of general awareness throughout Europe, America and Asia that hundreds and millions of people in rich and poor countries are experiencing rapidly falling consumption standards; that the crisis is getting worse, not better, and that it has escaped the control of public authorities, national and international."
Those clouds that Barack Obama spoke of in his inaugural address on Tuesday? They are already gathering alarmingly across Europe. And those storms that he mentioned? They are raging, too.
This spring will bring civil unrest throughout Europe, America and Asia, as millions start to point the finger at their politicians. It is becoming chillingly clear that Obama's "winter of our hardship" may barely have begun.
Since well before the inauguration of Barack Obama, European Union officials have been trying to organize the first summit meeting between their leaders and Obama. Unfortunately, the 27-nation bloc cannot agree on a venue.
Some experts in Europe fear the worst. "It is possible that Obama as an instinctive multilateralist will look to the EU. I think he may be disappointed by European divisions, impotence and lack of capabilities."
Kosovo unveiled its new army on Wednesday, which will operate under the supervision of NATO forces. Many of the new commanders are veterans of the insurgency against Serbia, and Belgrade says it will use all the diplomatic tools available to oppose the new force.
Eleven days before leaving office, the Bush administration signed a "strategic partnership" charter with Georgia that pledged cooperation with the former Soviet republic on defense, energy security and democratic development but made no specific US commitments.
To what extent Obama follows through may hinge in part on how the new president interprets the events of the Russia-Georgia war.
In short, Israel with all its cultural advantages, an educated workforce, and massive aid, is an economic and political disaster, dominated by enormous social inequality.
The Israeli government does not represent the interests of the majority of the Jewish people who live in Israel, let alone the Jewish people all over the world.
It is the political representative of a section of Israel's financial elite, a corrupt and venal clique of international gangsters who operate on behalf of their masters in Washington.
The future heralds intensifying conflicts both within Israel and with the Palestinians.
Israel warned on Thursday that it would resume bombing of the cross-border tunnels into Gaza if it detected evidence that Hamas is using the underground channels to replenish its arsenal.
Israel is attempting to assemble an international coalition to thwart weapons sales to Hamas, which would include patrols by US and European navies and improved monitoring of the Egyptian side of the border using high technology.
The US Navy was reported to have intercepted one Iranian vessel in the Red Sea that was carrying arms for landing in Sinai.
Israel has, perhaps irreparably, imperiled its relations with the neighboring Arab states and other Muslim nations.
(Cartoon: White washing war crimes)
Arabs were hopeful on Wednesday that Obama will amend US policy on the Middle East, while Israel expects little change.
Pakistan's military issued a blunt call for outside powers to stop demanding it do more and prove its sincerity in the campaign against militancy.
Israel's military attack does not only affect the "Palestinian problem" but has widespread regional implications for any future political or military engagement with Iran.
"We should work to punish all of the members of the axis of evil..." said Olmert when he announced the ceasefire, "Hamas was supported by Iran, which in addition to trying to achieve regional hegemony is trying to consolidate its power in Gaza."
On January 14, at the invitation of Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, Also Known As Obama (hereafter known as AKA) and his sidekick, Joseph Biden, paid a visit to the Supreme Court, spending the better part of an hour sequestered in secrecy with 8 of the 9 Supreme Court Justices.
Very few sources in the mainstream media picked up this story. It certainly wasn't the lead story on any of the national news broadcasts. In fact, the only news sources printing this story were out of the way regional news outlets.
Were it not for the internet, and resourceful citizens [and The Daily WAR!], it is doubtful the American public would have become aware.
Could it be that mainstream media is very much aware of the eligibility problem of AKA, know for a fact he isn't eligible, and suppressed this story as they have suppressed so many stories they deem not in the best interests of their anti-American agenda?
The invitation of Chief Justice Roberts, the behind closed door meeting with a man who is the subject of lawsuits coming before the Supreme Court concerning his eligibility to the office of president, was not only inappropriate but leaves questionable the judicial conduct of the justices with whom AKA and Biden met.
The message to the American people, whether the intent of the Supreme Court Justices or not, is that they could care less about the US Constitution; that they have and will continue to do everything in their power to install AKA in the Oval Office despite his failure to produce one iota of evidence that he is, in fact, eligible to the office of president.
Barack Obama has retaken the oath of office that was administered by Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts at the ceremonial inauguration yesterday.
Legal experts had suggested the move because of the multiple stumbles and flubs at the original event.
According to a Fox News report, Roberts went to the White House late Wednesday and administered the oath, correctly, to Obama.
Also present were a pool reporter and a White House photographer.
The AP reports: "The president said he did not have his Bible with him, but that the oath was binding anyway."
Josh White of the Washington Post said the oath of office is required of a new president "before he can execute his power." And he noted, "the Constitution is clear that its 35 words must be spoken exactly."
"Out of a super-abundance of caution, perhaps he should do it again," a Yale professor, had suggested.
Retaking the oath, however, will not answer the multiple questions about Obama's eligibility that have been raised in a long list of lawsuits filed over his election.
Another conference before the justices is scheduled on the dispute Friday.
(And: Is Obama really president?)
What a long, strange trip Barack Obama's first full day as president turned out to be.
He began the day pushing for more transparency in government, only to end it by keeping TV cameras out when Chief Justice Roberts re-administered the oath of the presidency.
White House officials confirmed to me that new White House Counsel Greg Craig had advised the president to get sworn in a 2nd time, just to nip the issue in the bud and not let any controversy linger that perhaps the president had not been sworn in legitimately.
The move allowed one controversy to die, but a new one popped up. The whole point of the ceremony -- getting the word out there that the president was in fact inaugurated -- was undermined by the fact that now there's no videotape to prove he was sworn in.
A most disturbing report is circulating in the Kremlin today stating that the Barack Obama has survived a coup attempt.
According to these reports, the Bush-appointed Chief Justice John Roberts, 'deliberately' failed to properly administer the Oath of Office to Obama.
Not to an 'abundance of caution', these reports continue, was Obama re-administered the Oath of Office, but rather because during the past nearly 36 hours the United States has been governed by Secretary of Defense Gates who during his brief time as leader of the US is said to have 'purged' from the American Military Forces all officers previously loyal to both former Presidents Bush and Clinton.
To the ruthlessness that Gates has moved to protect his Nation, and now its new President, against his Nations own, but still Bush-Clinton controlled Intelligence Agencies, we have reported on many times previously -- including the 'death by suicide' of US Air Force Brigadier General Thomas L. Tinsley who Russian Intelligence sources report had tried to secretly transfer to Israel some of Americas most highly guarded nuclear missiles for the Israelis to use to attack Iran and Syria.
Obama will face a staggering array of challenges, most, if not all, of which stem from the policies of Bush.
But efforts at reform will fall short if we fail to probe and confront the powerful forces that wanted Bush's disastrous administration in the White House in the first place -- and that remain ready and able to maintain their influence behind the scenes today.
The media almost universally fails to grasp the immense contradiction between the sentiments that brought nearly 2 million people to Washington for the event and the politics that underlay what Obama actually said.
The speech itself, however, was crafted in large measure to appease the Republican right and signal continuity with its essential policies.
The central political aim of the new administration, like the one that it is replacing, will be protecting the interests and wealth of a narrow financial elite, who will be bailed out at the expense of millions of American workers and their families.
The reality that the new American president is an utterly conventional politician, the product of a corrupt political machine and the faithful servant of the financial and corporate interests that funded his election campaign will begin to set in.
I know exactly the day when I decided I could not vote for Barack Obama. It was June 4, 2008. Obama had given a speech to AIPAC assuring the lobby that they had his "non-negotiable" allegiance to Israel.
I knew then, on June 4, that US policy in the Middle East was not scheduled for "change" — and, thus, nothing was going to change at all.
The US government would continue its imperial wars in the region and elsewhere.
Chinese state media have launched an unexpected broadside at both departing President Bush and Barack Obama.
China Daily, the official English-language newspaper used to signal the Communist Party's views to the outside world, said Bush had taken a "wrecking-ball" to world affairs.
The comments, in the paper's main editorial, went on to express scepticism for Obama's vision of remaking America.
"The US leaders have never been shy of talking about their country's ambition to be the leader of the world," it said, sarcastically. "For them, it is a divinely granted destiny no matter what other nations think."
It said more was required than just the "goodwill" Obama might generate around the world.
(And: Chavez hopes, still wary)
The United States has got its groove back. Obama is seen by many, both at home and abroad, as a beacon of hope in a crisis-ridden world. Can the emotions awakened by his election and inauguration lead to the yearned for political renewal?
(No!: Can Obama heal the rifts?)
Barack Obama gets to work to tackle the multitude of challenges facing the United States. While Europeans are enthusiastic about the new president, this may not translate into sending more troops to Afghanistan. German newspapers nevertheless hope that Obama marks the dawn of a new age.
Every President has a honeymoon but Obama's won't last long, probably because the real world won't give him a pass.
The markets showed their lack of sentimentality by dropping sharply on inauguration day.
The Repugs are looking to knock off a Cabinet nominee, and do anything they can to show they are still a force to be dealt with.
(Cartoons: Obama takes office)
Barack Obama's accession to power reminds the plot of a Hollywood blockbuster about America's future, where the US president is is often portrayed as a black intellectual, who is greatly concerned about saving America from an imminent catastrophe.
We have all of that now: the black intellectual and the catastrophe. Let us just try to understand what it all means even if we are not average Americans.
Here we build a prima facae case supporting the idea that Hollywood continues to be a target for infiltration and subversion by a variety of state agencies, in particular the CIA.
Secret Service should hire him...
A "shy" photographer in Indonesia is in great demand because of his resemblance to Barack Obama.
Ilham Anas, 34, is already a celebrity in Jakarta -- where Obama once lived and went to school in the late 1960s, when his classmates knew him as Barry -- but his fame is spreading.
Russian Intelligence Analysts are reporting in the Kremlin that Obama's attempt to complete the building of his power base to topple the US Federal Reserve -- responsible for collapsing the economy of the US, and dragging the rest of the World with it -- was dealt a 'serious setback' with the last Kennedy scion, and daughter of the last American President to attempt to destroy the Federal Reserve, Caroline Kennedy removing herself from replacing the vacant Senate seat of the departing Hillary Clinton.
Further reports state that Obama, after being re-sworn into office, offered his 'full protection' to Kennedy and her remaining family to which close personal friends are reporting may sway her back to accepting the nomination.
Obama's ascent to the presidency is showing that for the first time since President Kennedy's assassination, the Vatican power structure is, once again, on the ascendancy since their defeat in 1865 during the American Civil War, but which, these reports state, almost assuredly means that another brutal American Civil War will soon have to be fought.
Oil rose slightly on Thursday towards $44 a barrel, supported by wintry weather in the northern hemisphere, OPEC supply curbs and a rally in European equities.
The slide in sterling has turned "disorderly". For the first time since this crisis began 18 months ago, I am seriously worried that the British government is losing control.
This is the moment when the "rubber hits the road" -- the moment when the reckless debt experiment of our economic and political leaders comes back to haunt.
What have our leaders wrought? The reckless conduct of the City, the fiscal incontinence of Gordon Brown, and the pitiful regulation of the UK housing boom have all combined to bring the country to the brink of disaster.
England has not defaulted since the Middle Ages. There is a real risk it may do so now.
The pound is a currency with no underpinning and should fall against the dollar and the euro, says Jim Rogers, chairman of Rogers Holdings and co-founder of the Quantum Fund with George Soros.
He says his view reflects the UK's dire economic situation: "It's simple, the UK has nothing to sell."
Rogers says the 2 main pillars of support for sterling have been North Sea oil and the strength of the UK financial services sector, in particular, the City of London's role.
But he says just as North Sea oil is running out, so London's standing as a major financial centre is set to suffer.
After Greece, and Spain, it's now Portugal. S&P has lowered the country's sovereign ranking from AA- to A+, due to a lack of structural reforms in the country.
FT Deutschland reports that this latest downgrade has led to near panic among investors, some of whom fear the disintegration of the euro area, and who have responded by selling euro assets.
Wall Street is losing faith in Washington's efforts to fix the financial crisis.
The financial crisis has called into serious question the credibility of western governments and may precipitate an eastward shift of power.
Further declines in real estate; banks bankrupt; lower class, middle class, and upper class borrowers are all in trouble now; plenty of pain ahead for all lenders and borrowers; Little in loans will ever be paid back...
The present economic crisis has convinced even some prominent free-marketeers that something is gravely amiss.
Truth be told, capitalism has yet to come to terms with several historical forces that cause it endless trouble: democracy, prosperity, and capitalism itself, the very entities that capitalist rulers claim to be fostering.
In sum, free-market corporate capitalism is by its nature a disaster waiting to happen. Its essence is the transformation of living nature into mountains of commodities and commodities into heaps of dead capital.
When left entirely to its own devices, capitalism foists its diseconomies and toxicity upon the general public and upon the natural environment -- and eventually begins to devour itself.
For American Jews, the Bernard Madoff scandal has not just caused deep financial pain. It also has been deeply personal.
The accused swindler managed money for numerous Jewish charities and wealthy Jews who are reeling from their monetary losses as well as a sense of betrayal that a fellow Jew could have harmed so many people.
(And: France probes Madoff scandal)
[WAR: "Yes, we can understand harming the gentiles/goyim -- but his own Jewish brethren? Oy vay!"]
Nationwide, food banks are reporting a 30% increase in the number of people seeking assistance -- double the increase reported just 6 months ago.
As a result of growing demand, 72% of food banks have been unable to adequately meet needs, resulting in cut backs in the amount of food they make available to pantries that serve food.
[CFR Opinion Roundup][Newseum][Global Incident Map][Earthweek][Day-Night Map][Tonight's Sky][Moon phase]
Mexico´s drugs, violence and corruption and all of its related ramifications will bring the country down through revolution by its people.
WAR for military: YAHOO! WARriors
WAR fund: PayPal (payable to thedailywarrior@gmail.com)
The Daily World Affairs Report / PO Box 1059 / Pearce, AZ 85625
