MFS - The Other News

                          Morning Posting.

• Bam AWOL on Vets Day.Today is Veter ans Day. Do you know where your president is? With his feeble flame of "hope" thoroughly doused here in the United States by last week's elections, President Obama has set out around the globe in search of throngs still enthralled by his flowery rhetoric. He found them, of course, in Indonesia this week by telling them about how Americans must stop mistrusting Islam. So that is why your president is halfway around the world instead of being here in the United States to celebrate the sacrifices American soldiers, sailors and airmen have made around the world to keep the real, still-burning flame of freedom alive. This aloofness of his really is becoming a problem. Not that Obama doesn't appreciate the sacrifices of veterans. He absolutely does. Just ask the Indonesians. He was in Jakarta for their Heroes Day this week to honor their veterans "who have sacrificed on behalf of this great country."In the same speech, Obama gave voice to a harsh criticism he has heard about freely elected governments. "Today, we sometimes hear that democracy stands in the way of economic progress," he said. The shocking statement raises the question: Where has Obama heard this fatuous claim and with whom has he been talking politics?Hmmm..Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power. Abe.Read the full story here.

• Muslim Group CAIR Advises Women Wearing Hijabs to Allow TSA ‘Enhanced Pat Downs’ Only on Head and Neck Area.You got to be kidding me?On Wednesday, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) issued a travel warning to Muslim airline passengers on U.S. aircraft in response to the Transportation Safety Administration’s (TSA) ‘enhanced pat down’ policy that went into effect in late October.CAIR said Muslims who object to full-body scans for religious reasons should know their rights if they are required to undergo a pat down, including asking for the procedure to be done in a private place. In addition, CAIR offered a “special recommendation” for Muslim women who wear a hijab, telling them they should tell the TSA officer that they should only be searched around their head and neck.In the “special recommendations for Muslim women who wear hijab,” it states: “Before you are patted down, you should remind the TSA officer that they are only supposed to pat down the area in question, in this scenario, your head and neck. They SHOULD NOT subject you to a full-body or partial-body pat-down.”You can hide a "PocketBattleship"under a burka in a matter of speech and they shouldn't pat them down?Read the full story here.

• Secret service agent breaks his long silence on the day Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas.The secret service agent who was at John F Kennedy’s side on the day he was assassinated has spoken for the first time of the moment he was killed. Clint Hill told how he saw the former U.S. President collapse into the back of his car and into his wife’s blood-splattered arms after being shot while driving through Dallas in November 1963. The couple were rushed to hospital and on the way Jacqui Kennedy looked at her dying husband and said: ‘What have they done? What have they done?'‘When I got to the presidential vehicle, just as I approached it, a third shot rang out, hitting the president in the head, just above the right ear and left a hole about the size of my palm.Read the full story here.

• The tragedy of Iraq’s Christians is that it does not interest anyone, Chaldean Catholic says.Under Saddam Hussein, Christians in Iraq were around a million. Today, more than half have fled, living as refugees in other countries, in particular Syria and Jordan. Those who are left behind feel betrayed and abandoned by the government and the international community, with only one desire, to be able to live and worship in peace.“There is now a real danger that Christians in the Middle East, and in Iraq in particular, of being exterminated, due to both persecution and large-scale emigration,” this according to Dr Joseph Seferta, an Iraqi-born Chaldean Catholic living in Birmingham, Britain, where he is a member of the Commission for Inter-faith Dialogue of the Archdiocese of Birmingham.While love is central in Christianity, it is hardly relevant in Islam. The few Qur’anic verses that mention love mean something that is totally different from the New Testament. In the Qur’an, Allah’s love is conditional upon man’s blind obedience to his laws. Thus, we read in verse 4:107, for example, “Allah loveth not the impious and the guilty.”Read the full story here.

• Pelosi Must Go.Instead of leading House Democrats for another two years, John Avlon says the outgoing Speaker should step down for good to avoid harming Democrats—and Obama’s reelection—any further.Madame Speaker—step away from the party leadership, before you hurt anyone else.Nancy Pelosi’s surprise decision to stay on as party leader serves no one but herself. And the only people cheering are Republicans.They’ve said as much—the “Fire Pelosi” sign outside GOP headquarters in D.C. has been changed to read “Hire Pelosi.” Now, some of her members are starting to speak out, with Illinois Rep. Mike Quigley bluntly telling the Associated Press that Pelosi is “politically toxic”. He’s right: the biggest gift Democrats can give the GOP would be to keep the profoundly unpopular Pelosi in power as Obama aims toward 2012.Read the full story here.

• Burma generals 'sign Aung San Suu Kyi release order'.Reports are coming out of Burma saying the military authorities have signed an order authorising the release of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.The Nobel laureate has been detained for 15 of the past 21 years, and her house arrest term expires on Saturday.There has been increased police activity outside her house in Rangoon, but as yet no official confirmation.However, Ms Suu Kyi is not expected to accept a conditional release if it excludes her from political activity.Read the full story here.

1. Obama Praises Jew-Free Indonesia.Obama is out there courting the Moslems again, but at least let him be truthful.“Obama heralds Indonesia’s political, religious diversity in latest outreach to Muslims.The U.S. President heaped praise upon Indonesia as the model of what an Islamic Country can be. He especially noted the incredible religious diversity of Indonesia when he remarked:"Across an archipelago that contains some of G-d’s most beautiful creations, islands rising above an ocean named for peace, people choose to worship G-d as they please. Islam flourishes, but so do other faiths."Are other faiths in Indonesia “flourishing?” According to the latest statistics (from the U.S. government), over 86 percent of Indonesians are Muslim. That makes 209,000,000 practicing Muslims in the country. Let’s see about the other “flourishing religions”:    --- 5.7 percent of Indonesians are Protestant    ----- 3 percent are Roman Catholic---1.8 percent are Hindu  --------.00001 percent are Jews.That’s right, 209,000,000 Muslims and 20 Jews.If this is Obama’s definition of “flourishing religious diversity,” I am really worried.Read the full "Diversity" story here.

• The Fed Trashes the Dollar. If it is the first responsibility of the Federal Reserve to protect the dollars that Americans earn and save, is it not dereliction of duty for the Fed to pursue a policy to bleed value from those dollars? For that is what Chairman Ben Bernanke is up to with his QE2, or “quantitative easing.”Translation: The Fed is committed to buy $600 billion in bonds from banks and pay for them by printing money that will then be deposited in those banks. The more dollars that flood into the economy, the less every one of them is worth.Bernanke is not just risking inflation. He is inducing inflation.Sarah Palin has nailed cold what Bernanke is about: “We shouldn’t be playing around with inflation. It’s not for nothing Reagan called it ‘as violent as a mugger, as frightening as an armed robber and as deadly as a hit man.’As for inflation, are not the prices of gold, silver, oil and other commodities flashing signals that it is on the way?Today, it takes seventy $20 bills to buy a $20 gold piece, which means the dollar can buy in 2010 what you could get for 2 pennies in 1910. Quite a record for a central bank set up to protect the dollar.Read the full crash story here.

• Watchdog Planned for Online Privacy .The Obama administration is preparing a stepped-up approach to policing Internet privacy that calls for new laws and the creation of a new position to oversee the effort, people familiar with the situation tell the Wall Street Journal.The strategy is expected to be unveiled in a report being issued by the U.S. Commerce Department in coming weeks, these people said, though the report isn't yet final and could change.This and other initiatives would mark a turning point in Internet policy. Recent administrations typically steered away from Internet regulations out of concern for stifling innovation. But the increasingly central role of personal information in the Internet economy helped spark government action, according to people familiar with the situation.There is no comprehensive U.S. law that protects consumer privacy online. Internet privacy issues generally are policed by the FTC, which can take action only if a privacy-violating action is deemed "deceptive" or "unfair."Hmmm....sounds like an Democrats only party to me,Ivan Grozny and his Oprichniki.Read the full story here.

• Obama Has Visited Indonesian Mosque But No Synagogue Anywhere Since Taking Office.President and Mrs. Obama visited a controversial mosque in Indonesia on Wednesday, but there is no indication the president has visited a synagogue anywhere since becoming president, according to a review of the White House Web site and news reports.When directly asked by telephone and email whether the president had ever visited a synagogue since taking office, the White House press office did not respond.On Wednesday, Obama and his wife were photographed outside the Istiqlal Mosque in Jakarta. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad attended a Friday prayer service at the same mosque during a trip to Indonesia four years ago. Before his visit to the mosque, Ahmadinejad had given speeches in Indonesia in which he predicted that Israel would be destroyed, cast doubt on the historical fact of the Holocaust and said that every young Muslim man is an "atomic bomb." At the mosque, the congregation greeted Ahmadinejad with a chant of: "God is great."Spero believes a goal of Obama’s presidency is to “mainstream Islam,” and visiting the mosque fits that agenda, while visiting a synagogue would not.Hmmm....Or he's just afraid he might be struck by lightning when entering a synagogue?Read the full story here.

• Osama Bin Laden appoints new commander to direct Al Qaeda operations against the West.Osama Bin Laden has appointed a new lieutenant to lead a flurry of Al Qaeda operations against the West.Known to intelligence as Saif al-Adel - or 'Sword of the Just' - the new chief of international operations is believed to be behind the recent terror alerts across Europe and the mid-air parcel-bomb plot.U.S. and Pakistani sources said that al-Adel was running several operations aimed at convincing the West that the war against terror was unwinnable.Al-Adel was captured by Iranian forces and held along its Caspian coast with his wife Wafa and five children for several years.But in April he was released from custody as part of a prisoner swap along with Saad bin Laden, Osama's son, and top Al Qaeda operatives Suleiman al-Gaith and Mahfouz al-Walid.U.S. intelligence documents also claimed he had worked as an instructor at Al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan and Somalia and took part in several attacks.Read the full story here.

• Hate preacher Omar Bakri is sentenced to life for training and funding Al Qaeda members.Hate cleric Omar Bakri has been sentenced to life in prison by a military court in the Lebanon for allegedly helping to train members of Al Qaeda at a terror camp in Tripoli.The Syrian-born preacher, who was not in court when the punishment was handed out, was also accused of fund raising for Osama Bin Laden's fanatics in the middle eastern country.Bakri, who became known as the ‘Tottenham Ayatollah’ during his time in Britain has previously issued rants blaming the British public and Government for the 7/7 London bombings and calling for Christmas to be 'completely forbidden'.British-born Muslim cleric Anjem Choudary, Bakri's right hand man in the UK, said: 'It will be a sad day for Islam if Omar Bakri is ever silenced.'His profile is still massive and he is a big influence on Muslims in the UK. This was politically motivated after the Lebanese government came under pressure from Britain and America.'Read the full story here.

• Anti-terror bureau: Leave Sinai at once.Officials issue grave warning, citing credible terror threat to abduct Israelis in Egyptian peninsula; however, travelers unimpressed by alert, 'we know Sinai is safer than Israel,' one tourist says.The Counter-Terrorism Bureau is urging Israelis to leave Egypt's Sinai Peninsula at once and return to Israel. The grave advisory also urges the relatives of Israelis in Sinai to contact them and update them about the warning.A statement issued by the Prime Minister's Office Thursday evening warned Israelis that up-to-date, credible information elicited by security authorities shows that a cell belonging to the Army of Islam group, affiliated with Global Jihad organizations, is in Sinai at this time in order to abduct Israelis.Meanwhile, Egyptian security officials said that authorities detained some 25 jihadists in recent days. The sources told Palestinian news agency Ma'an that the radical Islamists were planning to target peace-keeping forces in the Sinai as well as Israeli tourists.Read the full story here.

• Four-year-old killed after being stabbed 36 times with scissors as pregnant mother desperately tried to defend him.A 4-year-old boy died after he was stabbed 36 times with a pair of scissors by a teenager in a home invasion in Muskogee, Oklahoma.Dakota Lane and his 6-year-old brother were sleeping when the attack took place.The boy's mother Stephanie Lane, who is eight months pregnant, tried to fend off the attacker, but her son Dakota died later in hospital. The attacker, Aaron Michael Laconsello, 18, was arrested soon after the incident on the campus of nearby Bacone College, and is being held without bond on complaints of first-degree murder, first-degree burglary and assault with a deadly weapon.Pedro Zardeneta said, 'In my entire career, I've never seen anything like this.'Neighbors say Laconsello and friends often drank at a house near to the Lanes' home, and he had been drinking earlier that evening.It's for "people" like this that the death penalty is needed .Read the full story here.

• Greek town becomes flash point in effort to halt Muslim immigrants.NEA VISSA, GREECE - This little farming town on the edge of Europe, where the crosses of Greek Orthodox churches face Turkey's minarets scarcely a mile away, has become the latest battleground in the continent's war against a flood of unwanted immigrants from the strife-torn Muslim world.Greek authorities calculate they arrested about 45,000 illegal immigrants in the first half of the year, most of them near here, accounting for 90 percent of the illegal immigrants taken into custody in all of Western Europe. As many as 350 illegal immigrants a day were being captured in the Evros Valley farmlands around Nea Vissa, according to Maj. Athanasios Kokkalakis of the Interior Ministry.Captured immigrants from those countries are taken to Interior Ministry detention centers for processing. Because of crowding, most are freed after a few days with an order to return home within two months. Typically, specialists said, they tear up the order and go on their way. Turkey has become the source of so many Europe-bound illegal immigrants mainly because of geography, which places two wars near its borders, in Iraq and Afghanistan, along with a large dissatisfied population in Iran. But Greek authorities charge it indirectly facilitates the flow by refusing to take most captured illegal immigrants back and, as part of its pan-Muslim policies, granting entry without visas to planeloads of would-be emigrants from Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco.Read the full story here.

• Foiled at the 11th hour, 'Islamic terrorist' plot to assassinate France's leading Muslim cleric.Five alleged Islamic terrorists arrested in Paris this week were planning to assassinate the city’s leading Muslim cleric, it emerged today. All of the men, who are French passport holders, are believed to have returned from fighting British and American troops alongside the Taliban in Afghanistan. The murder plot against Dalil Boubakeur, rector of the French capital’s main mosque, was only foiled at the eleventh hour thanks to a tip-off.Security has also been stepped up around leading public figures in France, including Carla Bruni, who is seen as an assassination target. Intelligence chief Mr Squarcini said the five men were seen as important figures in the current ‘global threat’ against France.‘Thanks to our system we can protect freedom of thought and freedom of expression and have the freedom to live together in this dangerous world.The foiled plot illustrates the growing rift between Islamic moderates and those prepared to kill and maim in the name of their religion, said Mr Boubaker.Read the full story here.

• EU suggests Iran talks in Europe, not Istanbul.The EU's diplomacy chief Catherine Ashton is expected to agree to Iran's proposal to hold new nuclear talks on Dec. 5 but not to its choice of venue in Istanbul, a European diplomat said Friday.The source, who has direct knowledge of the situation, said Ashton was expected to respond officially by the end of the day. Tehran proposed earlier this week to resume its long-stalled nuclear negotiations with major world powers in Istanbul on Nov. 23 or Dec. 5.The source said there had been consultations between Ashton and the powers she represents in the talks - Britain, China, France, Russia, Germany and the United States - over the last 48 hours and that the EU diplomat would propose a venue "somewhere in Europe, most likely Switzerland."Read the full story here.

• HT:LogisticsMonster.AYFKM? New Round Of Aid To Palestinian Authority Brings Total To $225 Million.We KNOW we are underwater, ’9.6%’ unemployment, 48 million Americans on foodstamps, numerous states in budget shortfall, The Fed printing money like there is no tomorrow, and we are staring inflation dead in the eye. Big Government does not even bat an eye; the day after the pResident’s debt commission comes out with a proposal that features cutting Social Security benefits to seniors, and the mortgage interest credit for Americans than can still actually own property, Secretary of State Clinton promises ANOTHER $150 MILLION to the Palestinian Authority.The secretary of state said the funds bring U.S. direct budget assistance to the Palestinian Authority to $225 million this year. Overall support and investment to the Palestinians is nearly $600 million for the year.A must read post because there's lots more where this came from! Read the full story here.

• Nearly $1 Trillion Net Tax Hike Proposed in Fiscal Commission’s ‘Tax Reform’ Plan. Over the next 10 years, Americans could see a net federal tax hike of $961 billion if the draft recommendations of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform are enacted. This proposed tax hike would include those earning below $250,000, the people that President Barack Obama has repeatedly pledged would not see a tax hike.The report projects $751 billion in revenue from changes to the tax code and another $210 billion from “other revenue.”“The American people will no doubt have a healthy and robust debate about these options, as they should,” Coburn said. “However, I would encourage taxpayers to view with great suspicion the beltway, interest group culture that often prefers demagoguery over honest debate. In the real world, no family facing tough economic times has the luxury of treating portions of their budget as sacrosanct. Neither should Congress.”Read the full story here.

• HT:Memri. Arab Parliament Sec-Gen: Al-Hariri Indictment Will Bring Down Lebanon's Regime.Adnan Omran, secretary-general of the Arab Parliament and former Syrian information minister, warned in a lecture that the release of the indictment in the case of the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Al-Hariri is likely to lead to the toppling of the Lebanese regime, or to the rise of an alternative government. Omran called the U.S.'s Middle East policy "Israeli" and said that the EU was an economic giant but a political dwarf subjugate to the will of the U.S.Source.

• HT:IsraelMatzav.Beck unsubstantiated?I had the video of Glenn Beck's takedown of George Soros open all day on Thursday, but I just didn't have the hour to watch it. It doesn't matter. I know this story well and I know well enough how to answer it.The American Jewish Left hates Glenn Beck so much that they will defend anyone against him.A must read !Read the full story here.

• HT:Memri.Sunni Mufti of Mt. Lebanon Sheik Muhammad Ali Al-Jozo: Hizbullah Is Placing "the Future of the Sunnis throughout the Region in Jeopardy".See and read the full story here.

• Some Muslims Attending Capitol Hill Prayer Group Have Terror Ties, Probe Reveals.An Al Qaeda leader, the head of a designated terror organization and a confessed jihadist-in-training are among a "Who's Who" of controversial figures who have participated in weekly prayer sessions on Capitol Hill since the 2001 terror attacks, an investigation by FoxNews.com reveals."The U.S. Capitol ought to be one of the most transparent and public bodies, yet they get some public criticism about who they’re bringing in and they pull down their website," said Patrick Poole, an anti-terrorism consultant to law enforcement and the U.S. military who has written about CMSA for the conservative blog Pajamas Media."That’s not behavior conducive to people drawing public salaries and working in the halls of Congress,” Poole said.“There is a pattern of seriously bad actors not just being involved with, but leading this organization,” Poole said. “There really needs to be some kind of investigation into who else CMSA is or has been bringing onto the Hill.”Read the full story here.

• Pope Calls for Religious Freedom in Muslim States.Pope Benedict Thursday said all states must guarantee the freedom for everyone to practice their faith publicly, a clear criticism of some Muslim countries where religious rights are restricted.The pope issued the call in a document of nearly 200 pages called an "apostolic exhortation," in which he offered his reflections on a synod of bishops that met in the Vatican in 2008 on the theme the "Word of God."He said the Catholic Church respected all religions and a separate section of the document was dedicated to relations with Muslims."Reciprocity" is the term the Roman Catholic Church uses in demanding full rights for Christians in Islamic states where laws prohibit them from practicing their faith openly. It has often asked for reciprocity with Saudi Arabia.The freedom to practice Christianity, or any religion other than Islam, is not always permitted in the Gulf and varies from country to country. Saudi Arabia, which observes an austere form of Sunni Islam, has the tightest restrictions.The Vatican says Christians in predominantly Muslim countries should be allowed to practice their faith openly, just as Muslims can in predominantly Christian countries in Europe.Read the full story here.

• Fire chief bans religious service to mark Remembrance day in case it offends non-Christians.A fire chief has been slammed after he scrapped his brigade's annual religious service to mark Remembrance Day in case it offended non-Christians.Staff at the Norfolk Fire and Rescue Service used to hear prayers said by a local chaplain before and after the traditional two minute silence at 11am.But new chief fire officer Nigel Williams decided to axe the religious element of the service held at brigade headquarters at Hethersett near Norwich.The decision was made after he was told that several staff were 'uncomfortable' with the religious nature of the ceremony. Around 40 staff still gathered in the mess room yesterday (thurs) to stand in silence and lay poppy wreaths - but there were no Christian prayers said.Instead a senior fire officer simply read war poet Laurence Binyon's famous poem For the Fallen before the silence.Neil Harvey, a committee member of Norfolk Retained Firefighters' Union, said: 'I'm astounded. The people we're remembering here don't want to be anonymous and don't want their faith to be anonymous.The Spiritual Works of Mercy : To pray for the living and the dead ! Hmmm...how long before Christmas celebration is banned in certain parts of the U.K?An educated guess ...one month from now.Read the full story here.

• HT:TheJawaReport.Exclusive: British Arrest Revolution Muslim Member Bilal Ahmad.A 23-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of encouraging an act of terrorism in connection with a website listing MPs who voted for the Iraq war.West Midlands Police said they arrested the man, from Dunstall, Wolverhampton, at about 0930 GMT on Wednesday.After searching his home, officers seized computer and electronic equipment for examination.Jawa Report can tell you that the arrested man's name is actually Bilal Ahmad. Or at least that's how he spelled it online, before he tried to disappear himself after posting his threat against the British MP's. It was fun to watch him try though. He's a very well known online terror supporter. Read the full story here.

• HT:GatewayPundit.Michelle Malkin Schools Obama on Islamic Jihad (Video).55% of Arabs surveyed believe offensive words or actions justify violence.Millions of Muslims believe that violence against civilian targets in the name of Islam can be justified.25% of younger US Muslims approve of suicide bombings.1 of 4 citizens in Turkey believe that blowing up innocents is an acceptable practice.Less than half of Pakistanis think it is a good idea to “pursue and capture Al Qaeda or Taliban fighters.”Tonight Michelle Malkin explained jihad to our President Obama who flubbed the question this week in India.Read the full story here.

• HT:BeforeIt'sNews.Bombshell: FEMA Camps Confirmed !Former Gov. Jesse Ventura and his crew at Conspiracy Theory have blown the FEMA camp issue wide open in a truly groundbreaking episode from the program’s second season on TruTV. The “Police State” episode proves once and for all that the feds have trained to take on American citizens, planned for riots and disasters and made preparations to maintain order at any cost. Tune in this Friday, Nov. 12 at 10 PM Eastern/ 9 PM Central and leave the denial at the door.This powerful episode is the largest and most in-depth investigation into FEMA camps to date– and it is scheduled to air on television. Radio host and filmmaker Alex Jones returns to the series yet again, as the team takes you to confirmed on-the-ground facilities, confronts the legislators who authorized FEMA camps and breaks down the full-scale technologically-integrated police state that includes Fusion Centers, FEMA, the Department of Homeland Security and more.Another Congressman who co-sponsored the bill starkly admits that FEMA camps exist, but rationalizes that they were put in place to deal with “happy children.” This bizarre admission is another confirmation that Congress and the leadership in Washington are out of touch with the oppressive measures that have been authorized against the American people."A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves."Bertrand de Jouvenel .The thing the most bone chilling thing Bill Ayers said to me was that after the revolution succeeded and the government was overthrown, they believed they would have to eliminate 25 million Americans who would not conform to the new order.Read and see the full story here.

• HT:KleinVerzet.Anti-nationalism.This seems to be a classic case of co-ordination. On the day that van Rompuy declared the days of the nation-state to be over, in the Dutch MSM much was made of the founding of the Spinelli Group (list of membership here).On of its more prominent members are that other deeply 'federalist' Belgian, Guy Verhofstadt and leader of the European Greens and soixant-huitard Daniel Cohn-Bendit (the one that had the arrogance to place himself above a real head of state, president Vaclav Klaus). As van Rompuy was making his anti-nationalist statements in Berlin, the group thought it opportune to admonish the Dutch (NL), with Verhofstadt expressing his dismay over the support our current government enjoys from Geert Wilders' PVV. Anoter leading light, Groen-Links MEP Judith Sargentini just had to add "Also in the Netherlands we now see a government with a supporting party that turns its back towards Europe. Europe is however the solution to many of the problems we are facing, like the economic crisis".The Spinelli Group, in case your wondering, was founded to 'oppose nationalism and populism'. It hopes to attract academics and authors to give form to a pro-European (pro-EUnion) atmosphere. The group is named after Altiero Spinelli, who's wikipedia entry starts of in a totally NOT surprising way:Spinelli was born in Rome, and joined the Italian Communist Party (PCI).Quite tiresome in its predictability, isn't it?Hmm...and Obama who's happy to see a communist in India?Read the full story here.

• Gaza aid shipment off course after row with captain.Libyan coast guard says captain of ship carrying 10 aid workers set sail to Greece while vessel was still tied up due to row over money. Eyewitness: Scene was crazy.Workers trying to take aid by sea from Libya to Gaza are being held by the ship's captain against their will along with Libyan police officers, and heading for Greece, their charity and the Libyan coast guard said."The scene was crazy," said Saeb Shaath, an aid worker who was at the port helping the charity to dispatch the aid consignment and witnessed the incident."He (the captain) broke anchor without permission to leave," Shaath told Reuters by telephone from Libya. "He broke the ropes tying the ship ... and nearly capsized the ship when it hit the wall. There were a lot of people on that ship.""The Greek captain ... was reported to be saying he wanted to proceed to Greek islands and drop off the conveyers (aid workers) and Libyans, so that the Greek people could deal with them as illegal immigrants," the Road to Hope statement said.There was no immediate comment from the ship's captain or its owner. Read the full story here.

• Tory councillor arrested after using Twitter to call for female newspaper columnist to be stoned to death.He had earlier dismissed Twitter as a forum for ‘glib comment’.And Tory councillor Gareth Compton might now be wishing he had given somewhat more thought to his own posts on the social networking website.For after an ‘ill-conceived attempt at humour’ in which he allegedly called for a Muslim journalist to be stoned to death, Mr Compton has been arrested and bailed, suspended from his party, accused of ‘incitement to murder’ and branded a racist.The 38-year-old barrister had been reacting to a radio show ­featuring newspaper columnist Yasmin Alibhai-Brown discussing David Cameron’s visit to China.Mrs Alibhai-Brown, 60, said that, since the Iraq war and allegations of torture arising from the invasion, she did not think Mr Cameron or most other British politicians were morally qualified to speak out about human rights abuses.The comments inspired Mr Compton, who represents Erdington in Birmingham, to tweet: ‘Can someone please stone Yasmin ­Alibhai-Brown to death? I shan’t tell Amnesty if you don’t. It would be a blessing really.’Read the full story here.

• HT:TheAmericanDream.41 Facts About The History Of Central Banks In The United States That Our Children Are No Longer Taught In School.Today, most American students don't even understand what a central bank is, much less that the battle over central banks is one of the most important themes in U.S. history. The truth is that our nation was birthed in the midst of a conflict over taxation and the control of our money. Central banking has played a key role in nearly all of the wars that America has fought. Presidents that resisted the central bankers were shot, while others shamefully caved in to their demands. Our current central bank is called the Federal Reserve and it is about as "federal" as Federal Express is. The truth is that it is a privately-owned financial institution that is designed to ensnare the U.S. government in an endlessly expanding spiral of debt from which there is no escape. The Federal Reserve caused the Great Depression and the Federal Reserve is at the core of our current economic crisis. None of these things is taught to students in America's schools today.In 2010, young Americans are taught a sanitized version of American history that doesn't even make any sense. As with so many things, if you want to know what really happened just follow the money.The following are 41 facts about the history of central banks in the United States that every American should know.Read the full story here.

• Lutfur Rahman council promotes extremist preacher who supports wife-beating.The preacher, Abdur Raheem Green, has stated that “Islam is not compatible with democracy.” He also says that a husband has the right to administer “some type of physical force… a very light beating” to his wife, to prevent her from committing “evil.” There is, of course, a considerable irony here. You may remember that Lutfur won the mayoralty with the help of smear literature falsely claiming that his Labour opponent was… a wife-beater.Hmmm...How long before Christmas celebrations are abolished from Lutfur?Read the full story here.

• ROBBINS: Vietnam vets betrayed again.Pentagon bureaucrat wants to abridge 50th-anniversary ceremonies.The 50th-anniversary commemoration of the Vietnam War should be a time of reflection and redemption, when a grateful country pays a long-standing debt to veterans who nobly fought in the conflict but came home to scorn and spit. But if a Pentagon bureaucrat has his way, the Viet vets will be denied their rightful honors once again.The Obama administration has a bad enough reputation among veterans without signing off on this ill-advised plan. Whether the White House was involved in this affair or not, it surely will take the blame. Failing action from the executive branch, Congress should intervene to make sure the anniversary commemoration is undertaken in a way that fulfills its intent. The Vietnam generation deserves better than stripped-down, pro-forma honors. Its veterans were spit on once - they must not be treated that way again.Hmmm....time and effort to honor Indonesian fallen soldiers but none for America's hero's.Read the full story here.

• IDF pilot, navigator killed in jet crash.Bodies of Majors Amichay Itkis, Emanuel Levy retrieved hours after their F16I plane crashed into Ramon Crater during training flight. Human error believed to be cause of accident.The bodies of an Israeli pilot and navigator whose F-16I plane crashed in the Ramon crater during a training fight late Wednesday night were located Thursday afternoon following a long search which lasted throughout the night and morning hours.Air Force Commander Ido Nehushtan arrived at the families' homes on Thursday afternoon to deliver the devastating news of their sons' death.It appears that human error was the cause of the accident, perhaps loss of orientation, but all other planes of this type were grounded immediately. Within a few days it should be possible to rule out technical fault as the cause of the disaster.Read the full story here.

• Before Clinton meeting, Cantor's one-on-one with Bibi.While the Obama administration has been scrambling to find a way to try to salvage Israeli-Palestinian peace talks which have come to an impasse over resumed Israeli settlement building, Netanyahu has been sounding a triumphant note since he arrived in New Orleans over the weekend following the GOP gains in last Tuesday's midterm elections. Last night, Netanyahu met in New York for over an hour with incoming House Majority Leader Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.), who is set to become the highest ranking Jewish member of Congress in history."Eric stressed that the new Republican majority will serve as a check on the Administration and what has been, up until this point, one party rule in Washington," the readout continued. "He made clear that the Republican majority understands the special relationship between Israel and the United States, and that the security of each nation is reliant upon the other."Veteran observer of U.S.-Israeli relations Ron Kampeas said he found that statement "an eyebrow-raiser."Read the full story here.

• PA Blogger Arrested for Upsetting Muslim Facebook Readers.A 25-year-old Palestinian Authority university student who blogs in his spare time was arrested by PA security forces for upsetting his Muslim readers on Facebook. He was caught at an Internet café in Kalkilya, in western Samaria. According to a report published by the Bethlehem-based Ma’an news agency, the controversial blogger “claimed divinity” and said he was angry with his subjects, infuriating Muslim readers.He was updating his Facebook profile when security forces caught up with him, some two months after they started tracking down the altered verses from the Koran and the caricatures from Danish newspapers that he posted.Muslims often ask me why I left Islam,” al-Husseini wrote. “What strikes me is that Muslims can’t seem to understand that renouncing Islam is a choice offered to everyone and that anyone has the right to do so".Hmmm...It's also one of the Human Rights.Read the full story here.

• Time for something completely different.Get an AK-47 With Your Truck Purchase at One Florida Dealership.A truck dealership in Florida has found a new way to drive sales: When you buy a truck, you also get a free AK-47, MyFoxOrlando.com reports.It’s not a joke.After purchasing a truck from a Sanford, Fla., dealership, customers get a voucher for a gun shop, which will fill out the required federal and state forms and perform a background check. If you pass, you’ll be entitled to a gun. And if you’re not in the market for a gun, you get $400 off your truck purchase or vouchers for other stores.The gimmick appears to be working.Read the full story here.

• Prison dog kills feline drug dealer in 'arrest scuffle'.A cat with heroin-laden collar was killed by a Volga area jail dog while trying to smuggle the drug to a convict, the press service of the regional penitentiary department said.The inmate, kept in a jail in Russia's Volga Republic of Tatarstan, trained and tamed one of the prison's cats so that it could bring him drugs."The cat was taken outside the prison, where the convict's accomplices starved the animal for several days, then put a drug-laden collar on it and released near the jail," the department's press service said in a statement.The starving cat, with some 15 grams of heroin in the collar, rushed to its owner, hoping to get some food. It was caught and severely bitten by a prison guard dog shortly after crossing the main fence.Read the full story here.