Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Monday, March 09, 2009
WTH? ::: Chinese ships harass [U.S.] Navy
U.S.: Chinese ships harass Navy - China- msnbc.com
WASHINGTON - The Pentagon said Monday that Chinese ships shadowed and maneuvered dangerously close to a U.S. Navy vessel in what appeared to be an effort to harass the American crew.
The Obama administration is protesting to the Chinese government. The protest will be delivered to Beijing's military attache on Monday.
The Defense Department said in a statement that a Chinese intelligence ship and several others surrounded the USNS Impeccable, an unarmed vessel with a civilian merchant marine crew. The U.S. vessel was conducting ocean surveys Sunday in international waters in the South China Sea.
The statement said the Navy sprayed one ship with water from fire hoses to force it away and the Chinese crew members stripped to their underwear and continued closing within 25 feet.
Smile... George Galloway stoned in Egypt
George Galloway stoned in Egypt - Times Online
A convoy led by the maverick MP George Galloway carrying supplies for Gaza has been attacked in Egypt, apparently injuring several people travelling in his party.
The convoy, carrying aid worth £1 million, was pelted with stones and vandalised with anti-Hamas slogans after it stopped overnight in El-Arish, a small town around 28 miles from the Rafah border crossing with Gaza.
The attack comes weeks after Mr Galloway, of the Respect party, described Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak as a "tyrant" and "criminal" and demanded that he be overthrown by his country's armed forces.
Mr Galloway's party confirmed that Egyptian officials had also become embroiled in a dispute with the party over what type of goods they would be allowed to take into the territory through the Rafah crossing.
They were due to cross over into the Hamas-run territory today, but were so far believed to have been detained at Rafah this morning for more than an hour.
The biggest attack faced so far by the the 110-vehicle convoy, organised and led by the MP for Bethnal Green and Bow, came after it arrived in El-Arish on Saturday.
During a power cut – which is a frequent occurrence in the town – children had pelted the convoy with stones, a security official said.
"It's an absolute disgrace,'' convoy organiser Yvonne Ridley told the AFP news agency. "The power was cut. Under cover of darkness members of our convoy were attacked with stones.
"Vandals also wrote dirty words and anti-Hamas slogans. Several people in the convoy were injured in the attack."
The convoy had been held up in El-Arish after a dispute arose between organisers and Egyptian officials over the inclusion of non-medical aid in the convoy.
Great quote on FR re: Chavez...
Hugo Chavez seizes land owned by Irish tycoon
Socialism is when the government buys a business and runs it into the ground. Communism is when the government seizes a business and runs it into the ground.
Hugo Chavez seizes land owned by Irish tycoon
Hugo Chavez seizes land owned by Irish tycoon - Telegraph
His government announced it had taken control of 3,700 acres owned by the Dublin-based Smurfit Kappa Group.
Socialist leader Chavez said he was making the move because the land was being used to grow eucalyptus, a cardboard component, instead of food in violation of Venezuelan law.
The land-grab, affecting an estate in Venezuela's western state of Lara, is the second high-profile nationalisation in as many days.
Earlier this week Chavez ordered the takeover of a Venezuelan unit of US agriculture giant Cargill.
Speaking of his latest move against Smurfit Kappa on state TV, he said: "We are going to use all the eucalyptus wood sensibly and harvest other things there, beans, corn, sorghum, cassava and yam."
Public works minister Diosdado Cabello added: "The multinational Smurfit harvests a specific type of wood. It absorbs almost all the water in the subsoil and the only beneficiaries of the harvest are the owners of the company."
Chavez launched a nationwide land reform after taking office in 1999.
Venezuela's Chavista-dominated Nationality Assembly passed a law two years later giving the state power to seized underused farmland.
The takeover coincides with deepening shortages of food supplies in Venezuela and comes less than a month after Chavez won a referendum that will allow him to run an unlimited number of times for presidency.
Thatcher famously said that socialism only lasts until you run out of other people's money...
Looks like Chavez is going to run out of other people's land, too.
Saturday, March 07, 2009
London aghast at President Obama over gifts given to Prime Minister Brown
It is a little embarrassing. (But George Bush was the moron.)
London aghast at President Obama over gifts given to Prime Minister Brown
London aghast at President Obama over gifts given to Prime Minister Brown
BY David Saltonstall
Updated Saturday, March 7th 2009, 2:03 AM
Edmonds/AP
President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown walk from the Oval Office of the White House.
You'd think President Obama had booted the Brits out of America — again!
London newspapers are howling over a string of alleged snubs by Obama to British Prime Minister Gordon Brown during his visit to Washington last week — including a squabble over presidential gift-giving.
"President Obama has been rudeness personified towards Britain," sniffed The Daily Telegraph Friday. "His handling of the visit of the Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, to Washington was appalling."
The list of complaints is longer than the Magna Carta: Obama canceled a planned, podium-to-podium news conference with Brown (actually, none was ever scheduled); he recently removed a bust of former Prime Minister Winston Churchill from the Oval Office; and he gave gifts to the Brown family that were "about as exciting as a pair of socks," one Fleet Street wag whined.
That last bit might be true. After Brown presented Obama with a pen holder crafted from the timbers of the 19th century British warship HMS President (whose sister ship, HMS Resolute, provided the wood for the Oval Office's desk), Obama offered up ... 25 DVDs of American movie classics.
"Oh, give me strength," wrote one appalled Daily Telegraph staffer. "We do have television and DVD stores on this side of the Atlantic."
Never mind that Brown is blind in one eye and may have a hard time seeing the stars in "2001: A Space Odyssey," or that American DVDs are usually incompatible with British players.
Equally insulting, decided the Times of London, was Michelle Obama's "solipsistic" and "inherently dismissive" gifts to the Browns' two little boys, Fraser and John.
The offending souvenirs? Toy models of Marine One, the President's helicopter — gifts no doubt plucked from the White House gift shop at the last minute, The Times decided.
Brown's wife, Sarah, by contrast arrived with dresses for Sasha and Malia from the UK's trendy Top Shop (with matching necklaces) and a selection of books by British authors.
"A bit of thought had clearly gone into choosing them," crowed The Daily Mail. "Lovely."
The Brits have blown up the alleged snubs into new evidence that the "special relationship" between the two nations is no longer quite so special.
The hand-wringing began last month when Obama removed a bust of Churchill from the Oval Office and replaced it with his hero, Abraham Lincoln.
The Times of London immediately traced Obama's "disdain" for Churchill to Kenya, where Obama's grandfather was caught up in the Churchill-led suppression of the 1950s Mau Mau Rebellion that left thousands of
Kenyans dead."It's not surprising that Mr. Obama didn't want Churchill looking over his shoulder," explained one correspondent.
At this point, the two sides seem to be in full repair mode. The White House let it be known that Obama and Brown shared a chummy phone call as the prime minister was headed home.
And Friday, it was revealed that Obama would be granted a private audience with Queen Elizabeth when he is in London next month.
Quipped one reader of The Sun, "I hope Her Majesty likes DVDs."
Friday, March 06, 2009
Krauthammer ::: Deception at Core of Obama Plans
RealClearPolitics - Articles - Deception at Core of Obama Plans
[snip]
[snip]
What's going on? "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste," said Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. "This crisis provides the opportunity for us to do things that you could not do before."
Things. Now we know what they are. The markets' recent precipitous decline is a reaction not just to the absence of any plausible bank rescue plan, but also to the suspicion that Obama sees the continuing financial crisis as usefully creating the psychological conditions -- the sense of crisis bordering on fear-itself panic -- for enacting his "Big Bang" agenda to federalize and/or socialize health care, education and energy, the commanding heights of post-industrial society.
Clever politics, but intellectually dishonest to the core. Health, education and energy -- worthy and weighty as they may be -- are not the cause of our financial collapse. And they are not the cure. The fraudulent claim that they are both cause and cure is the rhetorical device by which an ambitious president intends to enact the most radical agenda of social transformation seen in our lifetime.
Canada judge: Man not responsible for beheading
Canada judge: Man not responsible for beheading
WINNIPEG, Manitoba (AP) - A Canadian judge ruled Thursday that a man accused of beheading and cannibalizing a fellow Greyhound bus passenger is not criminally responsible due to mental illness.The decision means Chinese immigrant Vince Li will be treated in a mental institution instead of going to prison. The family of victim Tim McLean dismissed the trial as a "rubber stamp" that allows Li to get away with murder.
"A crime was still committed here, a murder still occurred," said Carol deDelley, McLean's mother. "There was nobody else on that bus holding a knife, slicing up my child."
The judge said Li should not be held criminally accountable for stabbing McLean dozens of times last July and dismembering his body while horrified passengers fled.
Justice John Scurfield said Li's attack was "grotesque" and "barbaric" but "strongly suggestive of a mental disorder."
"He did not appreciate the actions he committed were morally wrong. He believed he was acting in self-defense," Scurfield said.
Both the prosecution and the defense argued Li can't be held responsible because Li was suffering from schizophrenia and believed God wanted him to kill McLean because the young man was a force of evil.
He will be institutionalized without a criminal record and will be reassessed every year by a mental health review board to determine if he is fit for release into the community.
DeDelley said a yearly hearing is ridiculous, and that Li should be locked up for the rest of his life.
Li's trial barely lasted two days and only heard from two witnesses, both psychiatrists, who testified he is mentally ill.
That Li killed the 22-year-old carnival worker was never in question at the trial. Li has admitted he killed McLean but pleaded not guilty.
Witnesses said Li attacked McLean unprovoked as their bus traveled at night along a desolate stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway.
An agreed statement of facts between the prosecution and defense detailed how passengers stood outside the bus as Li stabbed McLean dozens of times and beheaded and mutilated his body. Finding himself locked inside the bus, Li finally escaped through a window and was arrested.
Li then apologized and pleaded with police to kill him.
Police said McLean's body parts were found throughout the bus in plastic bags, and the victim's ear, nose and tongue were found in Li's pocket.
A psychiatrist called by the prosecution Wednesday testified that Li cut up McLean's body because he believed that he would come back to life and take revenge.
McLean's family is vowing to turn their attention to fighting the law that allows people who are found not criminally responsible to be released into the community once they are deemed well, without serving a minimum sentence in jail.
DeDelley said her son didn't die in vain. His death highlights concerns about the justice system, she said.
"Now people are aware that there is a problem," she said.
Thursday, March 05, 2009
'Oversight of the Internet is One of His Top Priorities' ::: Democrat Rep. Henry Waxman
Democrat Rep. Henry Waxman: 'Oversight of the Internet is One of His Top Priorities'
Posted on Mon Feb 16 20:59:38 2009 by kristinn
The American Spectator's Prowler column published today has a disturbing report on the plans by the Democratic Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee Henry Waxman to regulate political speech on the Internet.
In addition to details of methods Waxman is considering to rein in conservative talk radio, The Prowler reports on Waxman's desire to use the power of the federal government to investigate amd control political content on the Internet.
The article quotes an unnamed committee staffer as saying of Waxman's power grab:
"Does one heavily trafficked Internet site present one side of an issue and not link to sites that present alternative views? These are some of the questions the chairman is thinking about right now, and we are going to have an FCC that will finally have the people in place to answer them."
"Internet radio is becoming a big deal, and we're seeing that some web sites are able to control traffic and information, while other sites that may be of interest or use to citizens get limited traffic because of the way the people search and look for information. We're at very early stages on this, but the chairman has made it clear that oversight of the Internet is one of his top priorities."
"This isn't just about Limbaugh or a local radio host most of us haven't heard about. The FCC and state and local governments also have oversight over the Internet lines and the cable and telecom companies that operate them. We want to get alternative views on radio and TV, but we also want to makes sure those alternative views are read, heard and seen online, which is becoming increasingly video and audio driven. Thanks to the stimulus package, we've established that broadband networks -- the Internet -- are critical, national infrastructure. We think that gives us an opening to look at what runs over that critical infrastructure."
The article reports that Waxman intends to work with Democratic Party President Barack Hussein Obama's nominee to be chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, Julius Genachowski, who is awaiting confirmation by the Democrat controlled Senate, to investigate and regulate free speech on the Internet.
Wednesday, March 04, 2009
Venezuela's Chavez seizes U.S. food giants
UPDATE 3-Venezuela's Chavez seizes U.S. food giant unit | Markets | Bonds News | Reuters
CARACAS, March 4 (Reuters) - President Hugo Chavez seized a unit of American food giant Cargill on Wednesday and threatened to take over Venezuela's largest private company, renewing a nationalization drive as the OPEC nation's oil income plunges.
Chavez's clash with the food companies, demanding they produce cheaper rice, came less than three weeks after he won a referendum on allowing him to run for reelection and marked his first nationalization in seven months.
"I warn you this revolution means business," said Chavez, whose government has struggled with lower oil income and minor food shortages this year.
The anti-U.S. president, who has nationalized swaths of the economy, is popular among the poor for pressuring companies to produce cheap goods and for government programs that provide subsidized food in city slums.
The moves to tighten the government's grip over the food supply were criticized by the private sector and many economists who say the state distorts the supply chain and contributes to food shortages.
Chavez, an ally of communist Cuba, recently seized some rice mills belonging to Polar, Venezuela's largest private business, after accusing the food industry of skirting his price controls and failing to produce enough cheap rice.
U.S. company Cargill [CARG.UL], which operates one rice mill in Venezuela, said earlier in the week it was expecting a visit from officials even though it does not produce the type of rice that is at the center of the dispute.
Chavez said he ordered the takeover because Cargill -- one of the largest privately owned U.S companies -- avoids producing basic rice that is subject to government price controls.
"Prepare the decree, we are going to expropriate Cargill. We are not going to tolerate this," Chavez said.
Rape 'harmless fun' says lawyer
Rape 'harmless fun' says lawyer
THE alleged abduction and gang rape of a woman was dismissed as harmless fun by a female defence lawyer in a Bahrain trial yesterday.
Three men accused of the attack should be acquitted because young people often commit crimes for "fun", without criminal intent, said lawyer Fatima Al Hawaj.
The men, aged 19, 20 and 21, are accused at the High Criminal Court of snatching a Filpina off the street as she walked home from work at night, last September.
They allegedly drove her to an isolated area in Askar, gang raped her and then abandoned her, after stealing her mobile phone and purse.
All three deny abduction, rape and theft.
Ms Al Hawaj told judges that her clients were youngsters and that "minors' often committed crimes for fun, without ill-intent.
"It is general knowledge that youngsters commit crimes for the fun of it and not with the intention to harm others and I request the court to take that into consideration and clear my clients of the charges," she argued.
The 24-year-old woman failed to show up in court yesterday for cross-examination despite knowing about the session.
Attorney Mohammed Al Mutawa stepped in mid-session, saying he represented her and pledged to bring her to the next hearing.
Grab
"I am representing her in this case and she knows about the hearing, but couldn't make it due to personal reasons. I pledge to personally bring her to the next session," he told judges.
The woman was allegedly walking home from the hotel she works in Manama when the men, who were driving a rented car, followed her.
Prosecutors claim they grabbed her hands and dragged her into their car, drove her to a secluded area in Askar and gang-raped her.
The men then allegedly stole her mobile phone and purse, which contained cash and dumped her in the middle of the desert. She later managed to identify her abductors' car and the rape kit results were positive for the defendants' DNA, said the prosecution.
Is Obama Scared to Debate Rush?
The American Spectator : AmSpecBlog : Is Obama Scared to Debate Rush?
Is Obama Scared to Debate Rush?
Talk about too clever by half.
According to today's Politico story by Jonathan Martin, the entire decision to go after Rush Limbaugh was cooked up by supposedly clever White House aides and outside advisors. Says Martin in his story:
David Plouffe, Obama’s campaign manager last year and a member of his inner circle still, will publish an op-ed in Wednesday's Washington Post chiding Republicans for being "paralyzed with fear of crossing their leader.”
A senior White House aide has been tasked with helping to guide the Limbaugh strategy.
With the certainty that only a political idiot could not see, Rush has just taken these bozos up and called them out.
He has challenged Obama to a one-on-one debate on his radio show, no teleprompters please.
With an ineptness that leaves one breathless, the Obama team has now effectively labeled Obama himself as "paralyzed with fear" if in fact the President doesn't have the guts to accept Limbaugh's challenge. After all, if they claim that GOP chair Michael Steele and "Republicans" are cowards for not taking on Rush, Obama himself will surely have the guts to do what they claim Steele and Republicans do not: take on Rush Limbaugh one-on-one.
Not since 1981 when the striking Air Traffic Controllers Union dared Ronald Reagan to fire them has such a potentially momentous challenge occurred. In that showdown, union leaders smugly assumed Reagan would not have the guts to fire them as he promised. They guessed wrong. The resulting mass firings of thousands not only wrecked the union, historians later realized that it sent a sharp and chilling message to the leaders of the Soviet Union that Reagan was not to be fooled with. The event raised the stakes in the Cold War and famously resulted in sending the entire USSR to the ash heap of history.
Learning nothing from history, the Obama crowd has now set up a breathtakingly stupid proposition: either Obama debates Rush one-on-one or he is, in the words of his own staff, paralyzed with fear. Now there's a message to send to al Qaeda. The President of the United States has no guts.
Amazing.
Friday, February 27, 2009
Sowell on Palin ::: "Not One of Us"
RealClearPolitics - Articles - "Not One of Us"
February 24, 2009"Not One of Us"
By Thomas Sowell
If Barack Obama has been the most remarkable phenomenon of the recent political scene, Sarah Palin must be second. The emotional responses to each-- especially by the media and the intelligentsia -- go beyond anything that can be explained by the usual political differences of opinion on issues of the day.
That liberals would be thrilled by another liberal is not surprising. But there are conservative Republicans who voted for Barack Obama, and other conservatives who may not have voted for him, but who are quick to see in various pragmatic moves of his since taking office an indication that he is not an extremist.
Anyone familiar with history knows that Hitler and Stalin were pragmatic. After years of denouncing each other, they signed the Nazi-Soviet pact under which they became allies for a couple of years before going to war against one another.
Pragmatism tells you nothing about extremism. But the conservative intellectuals who seize upon President Obama's pragmatism to give him the benefit of the doubt are obviously bending over backward for some reason.
With Governor Palin, it is just the opposite. The conservative intelligentsia who react against her have remarkably little to say that will stand up to scrutiny. People who actually dealt with her, before she became a national figure, have expressed how much they were impressed by her intelligence.
Governor Palin's "inexperience" is a talking point that might have some plausibility if it were not for the fact that Barack Obama has far less experience in actually making policies than Sarah Palin has. Joe Biden has had decades of experience in being both consistently wrong and consistently a source of asinine statements.
Governor Palin's candidacy for the vice presidency was what galvanized grass roots Republicans in a way that John McCain never did. But there was something about her that turned even some conservative intellectuals against her and provoked visceral anger and hatred from liberal intellectuals.
Perhaps the best way to try to understand these reactions is to recall what Eleanor Roosevelt said when she first saw Whittaker Chambers, who had accused Alger Hiss of being a spy for the Soviet Union. Upon seeing the slouching, overweight and disheveled Chambers, she said, "He's not one of us."
The trim, erect and impeccably dressed Alger Hiss, with his Ivy League and New Deal pedigree, clearly was "one of us." As it turned out, he was also a liar and a spy for the Soviet Union.
[snip]
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
TSUCMU ::: Michael Jackson's brother Marlon plans slavery theme park
Michael Jackson's brother Marlon plans slavery theme park | The Courier-Mail
MICHAEL Jackson's brother has been criticised for reportedly planning to build a slavery theme park in Nigeria.Marlon Jackson is said to be prepared to invest in a $5.3 billion theme park where tourists can visit a replica slave ship and walk the route of shackled slaves, before playing a round of golf or relaxing by a pool, reports The Guardian
The former Jackson Five band member and the Badagry Historical Resort Development Project hope the park will attract African-American tourists keen to trace their roots back to Nigeria.
But critics have labeled the theme park inappropriate and an insult to the dead.
"It is not appropriate from a cultural or historical point of view," Nigerian historian Toyin Falola told the BBC.
"Moneymaking and historical memory are allies in the extension of capitalism. You cry with one eye and wipe it off with a cold beer, leaving the other eye open for gambling."
However, the investment group behind the plan says it will honour the history of the transatlantic slave trade and provide employment opportunities for Nigerians.
"This will be an adventurous ride giving you an historical overview of African music. From hologram images, concert footage, a state of the art recording facility, to robotic figures displaying the rhythmic beats from 300 years ago where music began leading up to the biggest African group in the world, The Jackson Five," The Motherland Group (TMG) said.
TMG believes the resort will pull in 1.4m visitors in the first year, rising to 4.4m in five years.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Follow-up ::: Arrest Made in Home Foreclosure Civil Disobedience Program
FOXNews.com - Arrest Made in Home Foreclosure Civil Disobedience Program - Local News | News Articles | National News | US News
Police in Baltimore today made what is believed to be the first arrest in a civil disobedience program aimed at supporting homeowners who refuse to vacate their foreclosed homes.
An activist with ACORN — the Association of Community Organization for Reform Now — faces criminal charges after breaking into a home in southeast Baltimore on Thursday to protest the foreclosure crisis sweeping the country.
"This is our house now," ACORN member Louis Beverly reportedly said after cutting a lock with bolt cutters at the home.
Beverly will be charged with fourth-degree burglary, according to Anthony Guglielmi, a spokesman for the Baltimore Police. Attempts to reach his attorney, Justin Brown, were not immediately successful.
Donna Hanks, who owned the home since 2001, lost it in September when she couldn't make her $1,995 mortgage payments. It was not immediately clear whether Hanks re-entered her home last week, but she was not expected to be arrested, Guglielmi said.
Other police departments contacted by FOXNews.com said arrests would be made if an individual is determined to be residing at a foreclosed home illegally.
[snip]
Good grief ::: RAY OF HOPE FOR QNS. HOMEOWNER
RAY OF HOPE FOR QNS. HOMEOWNER - New York Post
Mohammed Khoda bought his Queens home at the peak of the real-estate market, and now that "everything is crashing," he's hoping President Obama can save him from foreclosure.
"It was our dream to get a home in New York City," the Bangladeshi immigrant said. "And now we only hope to be able to live here."
Khoda, 59, bought his two-family home on 160th Street in Jamaica for $700,000 in 2006. He, his wife and 17-year-old daughter share it with a tenant.
He took out two loans, at 7.25 percent and 10 percent, and was paying a total of $5,200 a month.
The tenant was paying him $2,800 and he owned a profitable business, a variety store called Caps and Bells, that earned him $45,000 a year.
"I started having problems one year ago," Khoda recalled. "Sometimes, the tenant wouldn't pay his rent. Then I had a lot of repairs and renovations to the home."
Then the economy tanked. "Business went down about 50 percent," he said.
After he paid the rent for his store, there was nothing left to cover the mortgage - so he stopped paying it about a year ago. He tried and failed to sell the home.
Khoda is hoping that he will qualify for Obama's plan to allow some struggling homeowners to refinance their loans, potentially saving hundreds of dollars a month.
Obama's plan, he said, "gives us some hope."
Feds reject imams' complaint against US Airways
KSTP TV - Minneapolis and St. Paul - Feds reject imam's [sic] complaint against US Airways
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) - The U.S. Department of Transportation says an airline didn't discriminate against six imams when it removed them from a flight at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport in 2006.
The department's assistant general counsel, Samuel Podberesky, informed the Council on American-Islamic Relations of the department's conclusion in a Jan. 14 letter.
However, the department did fault US Airways for refusing to book the men on another flight after the FBI cleared them.
The letter is among several exhibits entered last week in a lawsuit the imams filed against the airline and the airport in federal court in Minneapolis. The trial is scheduled for August.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
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