Thursday, January 15, 2009
'Hamas trying to infiltrate IDF ranks'
[HT:YP]
IDF Chief of General Staff Lt. -Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi said Tuesday Hamas terrorists were attempting to infiltrate rank and file troops while wearing IDF uniform. (Snip) The IDF's top general went on to say that Hamas was using the Gaza Strip's non-combatants as human shields.
''In many cases Hamas forcefully prevents civilians from leaving the area."
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Human shields: Where's the outrage?
Hamas' use of the children and other innocents as human shields at the UN school got its desired. They fired mortars on Israeli troops, the troops returned the fire, and dozens of civilians died or were injured, along with the terrorists. There is a library full of evidence proving it isn't the first time Hamas has used innocents as human shields.
Hamas built armories in the basements of mosques and schools, private homes and hospitals. They create their bunkers and weapons factories in crowded neighborhoods. All of this "construction" was done out in the public. Under the watchful eye of the UN as well as human right's organizations such as Amnesty, Human Rights Watch (HRW), and B'tselem.
Where was Ken Roth, head of Human Rights Watch when Hamas was violating international law and setting up children as human shields? He was busy trumping up accusations of collective punishment against Israel for defending herself.
How about Irene Khan the Secretary General of Amnesty International? Surely she must have noticed that Hamas was "drawing targets" on hospital beds? No She was too busy blasting Israel for occupying Gaza, even though Israel left Gaza three years ago.
David Kretzmer and Gila Svirsky of B'tselem were too busy working on their annual report fabricating Palestinian civilian casualties to prevent any REAL civilian casualties.
Where is the outrage? Why is no one complaining that these supposed Human Rights groups have chosen to distort international law, ignoring the real danger to Gaza civilians...
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Israel's Path To Peace
There comes a point when violence is clearly the only answer. Peace most often throughout history is achieved through the application of relentless and superior firepower.
Now is such a time for Israel. Israel must defeat utterly the rabid, voodoo vermin known as Hamas. After launching more than three thousand rockets and mortars into Israel within the last year, Israel has every right and obligation to destroy Hamas...
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Barack Obama: it is no longer important to kill Osama bin Laden
Barack Obama last night suggested it was no longer important to kill Osama bin Laden. In an interview with CBS news the president-elect indicted he believes that it was more important now to simply contain the al-Qaeda leader. He said: "I think that we have to so weaken his infrastructure that, whether he is technically alive or not, he is so pinned down that he cannot function.
[exactly what George has been saying]
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Students protestors in Tehran burn pictures of Obama, Mubarak
Tehran - Islamist students in Tehran on Tuesday staged a protest in front of the Swiss embassy, shouting slogans in solidarity with Palestine and burning pictures of US president-elect Barack Obama and Egyptian President Hosny Mubarak. According to the ISNA news agency, the students hoisted the Palestinian flag in front of the Swiss embassy which acts as a intermediary of the United States with Iran
[another change that isn't]
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Democrats seek criminal probe of Bush 'abuses'
[meanwhile, GWOT in America...]
WASHINGTON — The incoming Obama administration should launch a criminal investigation of Bush administration officials to see whether they broke the law in the name of national security, a House Democratic report said Tuesday.
President-elect Barack Obama has been more cautious on the issue and has not endorsed such a recommendation.
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Face of Defense: U.S. Engineer in Iraq Earns Top Honors
Elizabeth Burg, an Army civilian who volunteered to deploy to Iraq, was selected for the award from among 22 engineer nominees by the panel at Corps of Engineers headquarters in Washington, D.C.
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“Back home I do research, so hands-on construction is something totally different than what I normally do, but I love it,” she said. “All fields of engineering offer the opportunity to help people and create great change in a very tangible way. It's a very hands-on way to leave your mark and create something to be proud."
Burg graduated with a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering. She now attends Mississippi State University, working toward her master’s degree. She volunteered to deploy, and has been working in the Balad office as a project engineer since November.
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"U.S. Military, Psycho Killers"
[meanwhile, in American media...]
The NYT banner series about Iraq and Afghanistan veterans accused of murder began in January last year but was quickly discontinued as readers noticed that the Times doggedly refused to provide any statistics comparing veteran murders with murders in any other group.
So they waited a year and are at it again - and again including no relevant comparisons... [snip]
Let's compare murders by veterans to murders by other 18- to 35-year-olds in the U.S. population at large. From 1976 to 2005, 18- to 24-year-olds -- both male and more gentle females -- committed homicide at a rate of 29.9 per 100,000. Twenty-five- to 35-year-olds committed homicides at a rate of 15.8 per 100,000.
Since 9/11, about 1.6 million troops have served in either Iraq or Afghanistan. That makes the homicide rate among veterans of these wars 7.6 per 100,000 -- or about one-third the homicide rate for their age group (18 to 35) in the general population of both sexes.
Comparing the veterans' rate of murder to only their male counterparts in the general population, we see that Iraq and Afghanistan veterans are about 10 times less likely to commit a murder than non-veterans of those wars.
[context is key - always look for the comparator or numbers are meaningless {and you're being played}]
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No love lost for Russia in freezing eastern Europe
His every breath a visible plume, the elderly Belgrade resident railed against Moscow on Monday for a standoff with Ukraine that has shut off natural gas supplies to millions of eastern Europeans while those to the west have plenty of heat."Russians always gave us nothing but misery. They should never be trusted, as this gas blackmail of Europe shows,"
Mingled with the misery is a sense of betrayal in nations such as Serbia and Bulgaria — countries with traditional religious and cultural ties to Russia, but a complicated love-hate relationship with the Kremlin.
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Russian Security Plan Prompts Fears Over Future Energy Wars
In June 2008, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev ordered a new security document entitled "Strategy of National Security of the Russian Federation until the Year 2020." Written under the direction of Nikolay Patrushev, secretary of the Kremlin's Security Council, the document reportedly sent tremors of concern through Western governments."(Russia's) international policy will focus on the access to the energy sources of the world, including the Middle East, Barents Sea, the Arctic Region, Caspian Sea and Central Asia," it reads. "The struggle for the hydrocarbon resources can be developed to the military confrontation as well, which can result with violation of balance on Russia's borders with the allies and the increasing of the nuclear countries."
After predictably naming the United States as its main rival, the document then ominously describes how Russia may maintain its position in the world in future and raises the specter of future military conflict over energy resources.
[they prepare to acquire it at all costs, we refuse to use what we have under us. And don't think our energy suicide will only wreck our economy: energy is political influence, now as ever.]
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Obama's First Act as President
On the question of global warming control, the confirmation hearings for President-Elect Obama's choices for environmental leadership posts present a critical juncture for the future of America and the world. While running for election, Barack Obama repeatedly declared our planet to be in peril from global warming, which he presumably has come to believe is significantly caused by human activity.
That augurs for extensive regulation, the expense of which can readily run into the trillion dollar range. Yet many highly competent scientists would say that there is no proof that human-caused CO2 emission is threatening the Earth, and there is no benefit to the environment from limiting CO2 emission.
When the Republican minority on the Senate Environment committee gets to voice a few questions of Obama's nominees (even if not in prime time), I hope they will stress two things:
1) the issue is critical, not just to the environment, but to the future of worthwhile energy efficiency and energy security policies for the United States, and
2) to live up to the President's promise of honesty, transparency and good science, the Administration needs to take a fresh look at whether human activity is really endangering the climate.
The minority needs to press the nominees with serious determination. Senator Inhofe should challenge Lisa Jackson and the other nominees to commit to engage with the minority on the committee.
In the context of lowered temperatures and actual predictions of renewed short term cooling, surely they can defer for a year. If not, they will be handing the Republicans a winning issue in 2010, because they will have begun to disrupt American industry in the cause of suspect science that is quite likely to prove deficient.
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"SUPPORT SCIENCE re CLIMATE CHANGE"
Whitehouse: mailto:president@whitehouse.gov
Obama Transition: http://change.gov/page/content/contact/
Senate-Reid: http://reid.senate.gov/contact/index.cfm
House-Pelosi: http://speaker.house.gov/contact/
YOUR Senator: http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
YOUR Congressman: https://forms.house.gov/wyr/welcome.shtml
or: Speed Message them with your personal distribution list...
Senate boosts wilderness protection across U.S.
In a rare Sunday session, the Senate advanced legislation that would set aside more than 2 million acres in nine states as wilderness. Majority Democrats assembled more than enough votes to overcome GOP stalling tactics in an early showdown for the new Congress. Republicans complained that Democrats did not allow amendments on the massive bill, which calls for the largest expansion of wilderness 'protection' in 25 years.
[our government is stealing this nation's land from its people - and no, when the government owns it it's not all of ours: it's none of ours]
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ESTATES OF PAIN
[HT:JH]
President-elect Obama and Congressional leaders intend to maintain the estate tax rather than let it expire on schedule in 2010. They will do so even though their economic stimulus plan is supposed to be about creating millions of new jobs in a hurry.
According to a 2006 Joint Economic Committee (JEC) study, the death tax has reduced the stock of capital in the economy by about $847 billion. If it were abolished, the economy would create roughly 1.3 million more small business jobs.
So the estate tax strikes most heavily at small- and medium-sized family-owned businesses that generate the majority of new American jobs. Thus, hitting these family businesses with a multimillion dollar tax bill when the owner dies won't help job creation.
But Republicans alone won't have much chance to stop this plan, so its fate will hang on Senate Democrats.
[and you {see above contacts}]
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NOT-SO-GREAT DEPRESSION
America's greatest depression fighter was Warren Gamaliel Harding, says the Cato's Institute's Jim Powell. He was elected president in 1920 and followed the much praised Woodrow Wilson -- who had built up huge federal bureaucracies, imprisoned dissenters and incurred $25 billion of debt.
Harding's Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover wanted government intervention, but Harding would have none of it. He insisted that relief measures were a local responsibility. Under Harding:
• Federal spending was cut from $6.3 billion in 1920 to $5 billion in 1921 and to $3.2 billion in 1922.
• The number of unemployed fell to 6.7 percent of the labor force -- in 1922.
• And just a year and a half after Harding became president, the Roaring 20s were underway; the unemployment rate declined to a low of 1.8 percent in 1926.
While Harding can hardly be considered a champion of laissez-faire economics, his pro-growth policies are directly responsible for the growth in prosperity America enjoyed through the Roaring 20s, says Powell.
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ABC's Chris Cuomo Actually Grills Nancy Pelosi on Accountability
[credit where due]
"Good Morning America" news anchor Chris Cuomo conducted a surprisingly tough interview with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Wednesday, grilling her on the lack of accountability for how 2008's financial bailout money has been spent. He told the powerful Democrat,"...I think there are a few issues that unite Americans like this. Don't waste our money, especially right now."
Regarding the news that Congress doesn't know how much of the $350 billion T.A.R.P has been spent, Cuomo challenged,"Why didn't savvy lawmakers like yourself, like Barney Frank, say, 'We're not going to just release this money with no strings. We'll build it in the law. We'll build in accountability?' Why didn't you do that?"
When the Speaker of the House attempted to pass blame off to President Bush, the ABC journalist retorted,"Are you saying that you can promise the American people, that going forward, with your president and your party, things will be different? That they will know where the money is?"
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Tensions rise with U.S.-Mexican border fence
EL PASO — The fence that the U.S. government is erecting along the border with Mexico had been a vague notion to Victor Serrano — until he drove by a new section near his house last month... [snip]"I was like, oh, man, I can't believe this is happening," Serrano, 20, says, standing in his yard three blocks from the border. "We're actually going to have a Berlin Wall here."
[typical: the Berlin Wall was meant to keep its own citizen in - not other nationals from entering illegally. The distinction evidently got by this 'professional' journalist]
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The long beam of the law
The NSW Police Force will spend about $2 million on a virtual reality shooting range as senior officers blame a lack of training for recruits being frightened of firearms. The police academy at Goulburn has ''only six lanes'' available for live fire, according to a tender request for the new training simulator.
(Snip) Senior police say the lack of access to shooting ranges has resulted in some younger officers receiving so little practice that they are scared of using their guns.
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Eric Holder: Gun Grabber
Despite a huge Democratic Senate majority, Eric Holder’s confirmation hearings are going to be difficult. He has a long record to defend. Whether it is his involvement and inconsistent statements about Bill Clinton’s pardon of fugitive financier Marc Rich’s or his pushing Clinton’s clemency of the FALN terrorists...(Snip)
He claimed that the Second Amendment posed 'no obstacle' to implementing gun bans...
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MSM Ignore India's Strict Gun Control Laws
Completely missing from media reports of the Mumbai attacks are India's strict gun control laws, which virtually disarmed the people at the point of attack, turning them almost inevitably - and almost immediately - into victims.
Should you - God forbid - find yourself in such a situation, you must act as though your life is already forfeit, since the jihadis will treat your life that way. Difficult though it is, acting to thwart or complicate the attack is the best way to save your life and those of others.
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Pelosi's Toy Story
Under a new law set to go into effect February 10, unsold toys, along with bikes, books and even children's clothing are destined for the scrap heap due to an overzealous law to increase toy safety.
The damage comes from new rules governing lead in children's products. After last year's scare over contaminated toys made in China, Congress leapt in to require all products aimed at children under 12 years old to be certified as safe and virtually lead-free by independent testing. The burden may be manageable for big manufacturers and retailers that can absorb the costs of discarded inventory and afford to hire more lawyers. Less likely to survive are hundreds of small businesses and craftspeople getting hit with new costs in a down economy.
Because the new rules apply retroactively, toys and clothes already on the shelf will have to be thrown out if they aren't certified as safe. When Congress passed the legislation in August, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi boasted that"With this legislation, we will not only be recalling, we will be removing those products from the shelves."
Yeehaw. While large retailers may ask manufacturers to take back uncertified products, independent stores may be stuck with inventory that is suddenly illegal to sell. One Web site, NationalBankruptcyDay.com, is cataloging the costs faced by small businesses...
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The Workshops Of Identity
by Bill Whittle
Part 4: Science and technology
The remarkable ownership of world-changing ideas produced by the United States is simply astonishing. That five percent of the world population could produce such staggering advances in knowledge, medicine, agriculture, instrumentation and basic research simply boggles any mind open enough to read a page.
Which narrows down the numbers of minds quite a bit.
Each year, scientists all around the world write research papers. These papers produce scientific citations. It’s fair to call these citations “units” of science, that is, a measure of how much ground-breaking science is being performed.
Listed by countries, China comes in sixth, preceeded by France, England, Germany and Japan, which produced, at number 2 on the list, 6,612,826 citations in a ten year period. During that time the United States produced 39,027,838 – more than six times as many as the runner-up.
All of those images of the deep structure of galaxies and nebulae are provided to the world at the expense of the American taxpayer and through the American genius that produced the Hubble and Chandra space telescopes. Every image of the moons of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune was sent to the world by American grad students at Cal Tech. The American university system is the envy of the world. Nowhere is there better science being done, and no where is there anything like the numbers of people receiving advanced scientific and engineering degrees.
But that is not all they are receiving. They are also receiving lethal doses of anti-Americanism and anti-Capitalism, main-lined directly and administered by morally blind charlatans like Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky – men who repeatedly acknowledge the “relativity of truth” and who distort and select facts so frequently and shamelessly that I will paraphrase Mark Twain by saying that the omission of the works of Chomsky and Zinn would make a fairly good library out of a library that hadn’t a book in it...
[Recommended > ]
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Prior Workshops of Identity > http://netizennewsbrief.blogspot.com/search?q=workshops
Warnings of budget 'Armageddon' don't rouse ordinary Californians
California
Under the Capitol dome in Sacramento, Democratic and Republican lawmakers battle in a state budget quagmire, trading charges of obstruction or constitutional end runs. The fed-up governor warns of a financial "Armageddon." [snip]
He said his liberal format show's biggest talk generator in the past several weeks wasn't Schwarzenegger's warning of "Armageddon." It was President-elect Barack Obama's selection of anti-gay marriage pastor Rick Warren to deliver his inaugural invocation... [snip]
In his world, Macy is worried about farmers who face drought and water shortages and can't understand why politicians simply "can't get spending under control" in Sacramento without more taxes or regulations damaging to the economy...
[because we keep (re)electing folks who believe in bigger government and more regulation]
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the Professional media...
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MSNBC: Media Shouldn't Cover RNC Criticism of Hillary
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Now that Barack Obama is assuming the presidency, partisan criticism is suddenly so passé. Just ask Chris Matthews. In the course of cheerleading anchoring the MSNBC coverage of Hillary Clinton's confirmation hearing today,
Matthews suggested that the media shouldn't cover the Republican National Committee's criticism of Clinton.
A few minutes earlier, Matthews had assured us that those who had the privilege of knowing Hillary personally were aware of what a "wonderful" person she is. Then it was time to attack Republicans for refusing to join the Hillary love-fest.
View video here.
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Network Evening Shows Downplay Geithner Tax Evasion as a 'Speed Bump'
The network evening shows didn’t have much of an appetite for Democratic hypocrisy among the team they hailed as a "superstar Cabinet" on Tuesday night. Timothy Geithner, Barack Obama’s nominee for Treasury Secretary, a man who would oversee the IRS, failed to pay $42,000 in Social Security and Medicare taxes -- and waited to pay more than half of that amount – $26,000 – only after Obama decided to nominate him.
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CNN Paints Barack Obama as Moses
CNN.com may have tired of the idea of Barack Obama as a political Messiah, so they’re switching it up. On Monday night, it posted a report from rural Mississippi headlined "Grandson of slaves: Obama is our Moses."
If you recall, TV reporters were upset when the McCain campaign did an ad depicting Obama as Moses (with a clip of Charlton Heston in The Ten Commandments). But when someone does it without joking, it qualifies as headline news.
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Michigan band drops Chiefs name for inaugural parade
Members of the Wyandotte Marching Chiefs high school band plan to perform in the inaugural parade in Washington, but they won't be known by the name they've had since the 1950s. (snip) the band from Roosevelt High School will perform as the Roosevelt High School Marching Band. Patches will be sewn over logos on band uniform sleeves and the band's Marching Chiefs banner won't be carried.
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Paris opens door to author fleeing Islamist threats
Paris - The award-winning feminist writer Taslima Nasreen, who is under death-threat from Islamist extremists, is to be housed in an artist's studio paid for by the city of Paris, more than a decade after she was forced into exile from her native Bangladesh.
Nasreen's outspoken stance on what she calls the inherent misogyny of conservative Muslim society in Bangladesh has sparked protests, riots and warrants for her arrest as well as a cash reward for her decapitation by religious fundamentalists...
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[public service, HT:SB]
"Cell phones go public today"
REMEMBER: Cell Phone Numbers Go Public today
REMINDER... all cell phone numbers are being
released to telemarketing companies tomorrow and
you will start to receive sale calls.
... YOU WILL BE CHARGED FOR THESE CALLS...
REMEMBER: Cell Phone Numbers Go Public today
REMINDER... all cell phone numbers are being
released to telemarketing companies tomorrow and
you will start to receive sale calls.
... YOU WILL BE CHARGED FOR THESE CALLS...
This is a phony warning. No need to do anything. You can read all about this hoax at
http://www.snopes.com/politics/business/cell411.asp
.
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