Wednesday

The Daily WAR (01-17)

Reading between the lines, and thinking outside the box . . .
 
 
 
    A Vatican spokesman is clarifying that young Joseph Ratzinger's mandatory enrollment with Hitler's youth organization "had no role in his life."
 
    In the past, Pope Benedict XVI's speeches have gotten him in trouble.
    Visiting the Holocaust memorial Yad Vashem, it was what he didn't say that irked his audience.
    Israel is disappointed, as are Jews in Germany.
 
    Pope Benedict XVI's trip to the Holy Land this week has been far from perfect, with the Israeli press blasting the speech he delievered at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial.
    The German press, though, has been kinder, praising him for upholding the memory of the Shoah.
 
    Vatican officials had hoped the run-up to the pontiff's visit would soften Israel's position over the Last Supper room, on Mount Zion, just outside the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem.
    The claimed site of King David's Tomb, revered by some Jews, is just below it and a minaret rises above it bearing witness to the room's 4 centuries as a mosque, which ended in 1948.
 
 
 
    Pope Benedict XVI travelled to one of the ancient centres of Christianity today and declared his strongest support yet for an independent Palestinian state.
    He challenged the reluctant Israeli leadership to find a 2-state solution to the enduring conflict in the Middle East as his increasingly political tour of the region reached Bethlehem.
    "The Holy See supports the right of your people to a sovereign Palestinian homeland in the land of your forefathers, secure and at peace with its neighbours, within internationally recognised borders."
 
    Pope Benedict XVI has called the separation wall between Israel and the West Bank a symbol of "stalemate."
 
    If Pope Benedict XVI so fervently supports a Palestinian state – which would split sections of Israel – he also should divide Rome, charged the leader of a coalition of more than 350 Israeli rabbinic leaders and pulpit rabbis.
 
 
 
    The German cabinet has agreed a "bad bank" scheme, to enable the country's lenders to remove remaining toxic assets from their balance sheets.
 
 
 
    The French National Assembly ignored a vote last week by the European Parliament and approved a 3-strikes bill on Tuesday.
 
    With millions of Europeans set to lose their jobs as a result of the worst recession in 60 years, unions are campaigning for a coordinated response at the EU level.
 
    Kosovo remains a festering boil, home to jihadists, drug distribution networks, and other 4GW elements of every sort.
    Serbia won't give it up, and the Albanians will not rest until every Serb is gone or dead and every Serbian church or cultural monument is obliterated.
    Hillary Clinton wants to push America's nose back into this beehive, or so the rumor mill in Washington has it.
 
    As Russian troops marched to celebrate the victory over Nazi Germany 8 May, NATO troops were beginning their month-long war "games" on Russia's southern border.
    The current games can only be interpreted by Moscow as a replay — hopefully farcical — of the Nazis in Georgia in WW2, which will strengthen their resolve to keep the enemy at bay.
 
    A 'war party' inside NATO does not want to let the partnership between Russia and the North Atlantic Organization happen.
    Moreover, this party plots against Obama who strives to reset the relationship between Washington and Moscow, Russia's Ambassador to NATO said.
    He presumes that there are officials the Alliance who are highly discontented with the policy of the new American leader.
 
    A Kremlin policy paper says international relations will be shaped by battles over energy resources, which may trigger military conflicts on Russia's borders.
    "The international policy in the long run will be focused on getting hold of energy sources, including in the Middle East, the Barents Sea shelf and other Arctic regions, the Caspian and Central Asia.
    "Amid competitive struggle for resources, attempts to use military force to solve emerging problems can't be excluded.
    "The existing balance of forces near the borders of the Russian Federation and its allies can be violated."
 
 
 
    On Monday, Benjamin Netanyahu will have his first formal meeting with Barack Obama in the White House.
    All the signs are that relations between Israel and its superpower ally are not as harmonious as usual.
 
    Jordan's King Abdullah warned that either a Palestinian state is created this year -- or there will be another war in the Middle East in 2010.
 
    Parts of the United States' policy in the Middle East under the Obama administration may, in fact, be influenced by Saudi Arabia, which is worried over increasing overtures by the US for a dialogue with Iran and may be leveraging the Pakistan situation to its advantage, according to a report from Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.
 
    Washington should put an end to its irrational policies in the region and pursue diplomatic rhetoric that is not undermined by sanctions, a Syrian daily said.
    The Tishreen newspaper, an Arabic-language daily in Damascus, ran a front-page editorial during the weekend lashing out at Washington's decision to extend sanctions on Syria while high-level US officials were advocating engagement.
 
    The US military today handed control of ancient Ur, the biblical birthplace of Abraham, back to Iraqi authorities, who hope now to relaunch it as a major tourism site.
    The site is renowned for its well preserved stepped platform or ziggurat, which dates back to the 3rd millennium BC.
 
    US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates's summary dismissal of the top US commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David McKiernan, is an indication of not only the sharply deteriorating situation confronting the US intervention in that country, but more broadly, the deep-going crisis within the American military as a whole.
    McKiernan is the first US commander in a theater of war to suffer such a fate since 1951, when President Truman ordered the removal of Gen. Douglas MacArthur as commander of US forces in Korea for insubordination and a frontal challenge to civilian control of the military.
    Evidently, the divisions within the US military command and the American political establishment as a whole are just as sharp today.
 
    Yep, it all comes down to black gold and "blue gold" (natural gas), hydrocarbon wealth beyond compare, and so it's time to trek back to that ever-flowing wonderland -- Pipelineistan.
    Above all, it's time to check out the most recent moves on the giant chessboard of Eurasia, where Washington wants to be a crucial, if not dominant, player.
 
 
 
    There is clearly a faction of the power elite that is, and has for some years been pressing, for a US military attack on Iran.
    Those advocating the attack on Iran don't mince words: the US must, they tell us, use its armed might to destroy Iran's nuclear program for Israel.
    The call for an attack on Iran, to the extent it is being voiced in the ruling class, is being most sharply framed by neocon columnists including some who recently served in the Bush administration.
    It is echoed by AIPAC and other Lobby organizations.
 
 
 
    A movement to reclaim for states all rights not specifically designated to the federal government in the US Constitution is exploding across the nation, with 35 states already acting or at least considering such proposals – and one state lawmaker estimating the nation as a whole could save $11 trillion in coming years if it would succeed.
    Essentially it's a reminder that the United States is made up of individual states; it's not a federal authority broken up into political subdivisions.
 
    First, it was a Missouri Analysis and Information Center report; then it was a Department of Homeland Security  report; now it is a New York congressman's bill.
    Each of these items, taken on their own, is problematic enough; taken together they portend "a clear and present danger" to the liberties of the American people.
 
    The last futile, expensive, and grotesquely immoral war launched by the US was authored by those ideological shape-shifters and creatures of legend, the neoconservatives.
 
    White House economic advisor and wanna-be White House Chief of Staff Larry Summers attended the 61st anniversary celebration at the Israeli Embassy in Washington, DC and delivered what he claimed were official remarks, sanctioned by Obama.
    Summers' self-professed "official" remarks immediately sent shock-waves through official Washington.
    Within the Obama Administration itself, Summers' actions produced a firestorm of behind-the-scenes protests, particularly from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Middle East peace envoy George Mitchell.
 
    Cheney has replaced Sarah Palin as Rogue Diva.
    Just as Jeb Bush and other Republicans are trying to get kinder and gentler, Cheney has popped out of his dungeon, scary organ music blaring, to carry on his nasty campaign of fear and loathing.
    The man who never talked is now the man who won't shut up.
 
    The "Hate Crimes Prevention Bill" will be in the Senate Judiciary Committee this week.
    It recently passed the House, causing the Anti-Defamation League to rejoice.
    The ADL called the law "an essential and necessary step forward in the national effort to counter hate crimes"and urged passage by the Senate.
    It also congratulated itself on taking a leadership role in promoting this legislation for the last 10 years.
    Other Jewish organizations have also been at the forefront of promoting "hate crime" legislation in the US and throughout the West.
 
 
 
    Foreclosures in April exceeded even March's blistering pace with a record 342,000 homes receiving notices of default, auction notices or undergoing bank repossessions.
    One of every 374 US homes received a filing during the month.
 
    Even as banks grapple with rising foreclosures, many lenders have something else to worry about: A rising tide of potential losses from commercial real estate loans that could reach into the billions.
    Delinquency rates and defaults on office and retail buildings and hotels have more than doubled in just 6 months.
    For apartments and industrial buildings, the rates have increased more than 80%.
 
    The rally has been based on the rise in bank stocks.
    To understand the rise in bank stocks, you must understand the stress test.
    The chief economist at Merrill Lynch retired last week.
    He may still be bullish on America, as the old Merrill slogan went, but he is not bullish on the present US stock market.
    He calls the rally a sucker's rally.
(Cartoons: STRESS TEST)
 
    To many Americans, Obama seems a flaming radical.
    To me, he is a pragmatic conservative, albeit one responding to extraordinary times.
    In his own way, Obama is following the path trodden by Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
    Nowhere is his conservatism more obvious than in the handling of the economic crisis.
 
    The New York Fed is the most powerful financial institution you've never heard of.
    A quasi-independent, public-private body, the New York Fed is the first among equals of the 12 regional Fed branches.
    Unlike the Washington Federal Reserve Board of Governors, or the other regional fed branches, the NY Fed is active in the markets virtually every day, changing the critical interest rates that determine the liquidity of the markets and the profitability of banks.
 
    The US government is planning to revive a bill that will punish China for artificially boosting its trade through "currency manipulation."
 
    In its regional economic outlook for Europe, the IMF warned about the severity of the recession, despite recent signs of improvement, and that Europe needs a much bigger degree of co-ordination, both in economic stimulus, and bank rescue.
 
    Falling investments and increasing delays in energy sector projects because of the global meltdown could lead to oil spiking to over $200 per barrel, Egypt's oil minister warned yesterday.
 
    Windsor is one of a growing list of unlikely suspects, ordinary people from ministers to ex-cops, citing financial duress since the start of the recession in late 2007 for allegedly turning to a crime that targets fast cash – bank robbery.
    Industry figures show that bank holdups go up during recessions, and experts say the pressure inevitably pushes some otherwise law-abiding people to find themselves accosting a teller at a window.
 
 
 
 
    The following, first published in December 2007, is relevant to the current debate and analysis on the H1N1 swine flu.
 
    While investigators trudge through pig farms and remote villages in Mexico, searching for clues about the new swine flu, answers about the virus' origin may finally appear on a computer, based on genetic codes.
 
 
 
    "Early the next morning King Hezekiah gathered the city officials together and went up to the temple of YAHWEH." (2Chr 29:20-36)
 
 
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