MFS - The Other News

                         Afternoon Posting.

• HT:Strategypage.Nuclear ,Biological and Chemical weapons.Cameras installed at an Iranian nuclear energy facility revealed the catastrophic amount of damage done to the centrifuge systems used to enrich uranium for nuclear power plants or, at higher levels, for nuclear weapons. The UN cameras recorded damaged centrifuge equipment being removed from the plant between late 2009 and early 2010. This was about the same time the Stuxnet computer worm was believed to be causing all that damage. But for the rest of 2010, the UN cameras showed replacement equipment coming into the facility outside the city of Natanz. Despite all the economic sanctions on Iran, they managed to build up a large centrifuge facility, and then replace up to 20 percent of the equipment damaged by Stuxnet.Hmmmm....Sanctions?What sanctions it's almost open borders with Turkey.Read the full story here.

• HT:Aina.Egyptian Christians Enraged Over Court Acquittal in Christmas Eve Massacre.The Egyptian Emergency State Security Court in Qena acquitted today two of the three suspects in the Christmas Eve Massacre in Nag Hammadi in January, 2010, where six Coptics, between the ages of 16 to 23, were shot and killed by Muslims in a drive-by shooting. The Copts were killed as they filed out of Church after celebrating the Coptic Christmas Eve midnight mass in Nag Hammadi, 600km south of Cairo A Muslim bystander was also killed and nine Copts were seriously injured.The three Muslims accused of the shootings were Mohamed Ahmed Hussein, more commonly known as Hamam el-Kamouny, Qurshi Abul Haggag and Hendawi Sayyed. Mohamed Ahmed Hussein, 39, was sentenced to death by the court on January 16 and the other two were acquitted today. The defendants were charged with using force to disrupt public order and intimidate citizens, with the premeditated murder of seven people, illegal possession of fire arms, the attempted murder of nine others, and voluntarily damaging fixed and liquid assets.Bishop Cyril, the Coptic Orthodox bishop of Nag Hammadi, said "The court imposed one death sentence because one Muslim was killed, and the Egyptian judiciary wasted the blood of the six murdered Copts, who are of no value to the society. This verdict saddened all Christians worldwide because it means that the State is applying Islamic Sharia on all Christians in Egypt." He explained that according to Sharia the blood of one Muslim, victim Ayman Hisham, is paid for by the blood of one Muslim, Al-Kamouny; since one Muslim died, one Muslim got the death penalty.Bishop Cyril accused the judge of being unjust and said he is contacting the lawyers to discuss the possibility of presenting an appeal to the military governor. "Had I not reported seeing killer Al-Kamouny he would have been acquitted like the rest of the previous acquittal cases."According to the Bishop, Pope Shenouda III is very sadden by this verdict.Mr. Kamal Nashed, father of 19-year-old law student Abanob, who died in the massacre, told Coptic activist Mariam Ragy "The ruling shocked us and was unjust. If the three participated in the killing they should all have received the same verdict." Nashed said that today's verdict was unjust. "I want justice for my son and will go after it till my very last day whether in Egypt or abroad."Since the court is a State Security Court, only the prosecution has the right of appeal, but they would apply to the Prosecutor General to appeal this verdict. "People think the police is corrupt," she said, " but after 20 years of practice as a lawyer, I can confirm the most corrupt organ in the system is the Egyptian judiciary."Sobhy said that he received hundreds of calls from people disappointed with the verdict. "Most comments I got from those people were that everyone thought that after the January 25 Revolution things would change, but unfortunately corruption is rooted to the core everywhere. This verdict only proves that what is being talked about lately of equality, justice and freedom of religious belief is just empty talk. If our constitution has sharia law embedded in it, then the bitter truth is that as Christians we have no place or value in this country."Hmmmm....Of course no word from the selfproclaimed 'Christian' President Hussein Obama.Read the full story here.

• Oil Price up ,what will precious metals do?U.S. oil prices soared more than 7% early Tuesday, coming within $2 of $100 a barrel. That's on top of the 6% surge on Monday. NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Libya is the first oil exporting nation to be engulfed in the political upheaval spreading across North Africa and the Middle East, and investors are worried that further chaos in the region will drive crude prices even higher.U.S. oil prices soared more than 7% early Tuesday, coming within $2 of $100 a barrel. That's on top of the 6% surge on Monday. The price spikes follow violent protests in Tripoli, Libya's capital, that claimed an estimated 200 lives over the weekend.Libya produces about 2% of the world's oil but is a major regional player. In 2010, the country produced about 1.65 million barrels per day, making it Africa's third-largest crude producer, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. It also supplies several hundred thousand barrels per day of natural gas and other liquid petroleum products. In addition, Libya sits atop large reserves of oil and gas that have yet to be developed. Libya holds around 44 billion barrels of oil reserves -- the largest in Africa -- according to Oil and Gas Journal, an industry publication. By contrast, Russia produces 10.1 million barrels per day, while the United States produces 9.8 million barrels per day, according to the Energy Information Administration. Saudi Arabia, currently observing OPEC production quotas, produces 8.57 million barrels per day. Those numbers include oil from ethanol, natural gas liquids and other products.The world consumes 87.5 million barrels of oil day. U.N. sanctions in place since 1992 had prevented most Western oil firms from operating in Libya after agents from the country's intelligence service were implicated in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103, which killed 270. The sanctions have left most of the country's natural gas reserves, along with a lot of its oil, fairly undeveloped. The sanctions were lifted in 2004, after Libya said it was disbanding its nuclear program and finished cooperating in the Pam Am case. In 2006, the United States officially took Libya off its list of states that sponsor terrorism. That opened the door for renewed investment in the oil and gas sector.While a complete shut down of production in Libya is unlikely, Wyman warned that the situation there remains highly uncertain and could become even more unstable if the nation's leader, Moammar Gadhafi, is deposed."Although Libya is an OPEC member, it is still a relatively small player," said Julian Jessop, an economist at Capital Economics. Libya, he added, ranks ninth on the list of output among the 12 members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries."In principle, any shortfall on global markets could easily be offset by an increase in output from Saudi Arabia," he said, adding that the OPEC leader is currently producing 3 million barrels per day less than its estimated capacity.Hmmmm......Perhaps stopsome more American Compagnies from drilling Mr President?We don't want the American economy recovering do we?Read the full story here.

• Petraeus's comments on coalition attack reportedly offend Karzai government.KABUL - To the shock of President Hamid Karzai's aides, Gen. David H. Petraeus suggested Sunday at the presidential palace that Afghans caught up in a coalition attack in northeastern Afghanistan might have burned their own children to exaggerate claims of civilian casualties, according to two participants at the meeting. The exact language Petraeus used The exact language Petraeus used in the closed-door session is not known, and neither is the precise message he meant to convey. But his remarks about the deadly U.S. military operation in Konar province were deemed deeply offensive by some in the room. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the private discussions. They said Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, dismissed allegations by Karzai's office and the provincial governor that civilians were killed and said residents had invented stories, or even injured their children, to pin the blame on U.S. forces and force an end to the operation. "I was dizzy. My head was spinning," said one participant, referring to Petraeus's remarks. "This was shocking. Would any father do this to his children? This is really absurd." Petraeus, through a spokesman, declined to comment. U.S. and Afghan officials are investigating what happened during the three- to four-day operation in the mountains of Ghaziabad district, one of the most dangerous and inhospitable parts of Afghanistan. U.S. military officials said there is no evidence that civilians died. The governor of Konar, Fazlullah Wahidi, disagreed, citing reports from villagers that dozens of women and children perished. Karzai's office placed the civilian death toll at 50.On Saturday, Wahidi, the provincial governor, sent a three-person fact-finding team up the valley to the village of Helgal. They returned with seven injured people, including a woman and a man, both 22 years old, and five boys and girls 16 or younger. Smith said they had burns and shrapnel wounds, none of them life-threatening. The U.S. military "did have initial reports that the feet and hands of the children appeared to have been burned," Smith said. "We have observed increased reporting of children being disciplined by having their hands and feet dipped into boiling water. No one is claiming this is the case in this instance, but it may well be." The Karzai government has repeatedly taken the U.S.-led coalition to task for killing noncombatants over the years. "Killing 60 people, and then blaming the killing on those same people, rather than apologizing for any deaths? This is inhuman," one Afghan official said. "This is a really terrible situation."Hmmmm......Somewhere in between these statements lays the naked cruel truth.Read the full story here.

• HT:NewsRealBlog.President Obama’s Citizenship and Faith Provide Premise for Show Trials.On a February 8th installment of “Hardball with Chris Matthews,” Matthews introduced a new media trend. His guests, Phillip Dennis of the Texas Tea Party and Matt Kibbe from FreedomWorks, were on the show to discuss the strength of the Tea Party within the new Congress, but the first question Matthews asks after introducing them is whether or not they believe Barack Obama is a Muslim. Although Phillip Dennis clearly stated that he was disinterested in Obama’s religious identity, Matthews spends the first four minutes of the interview sparring with him in an attempt to unearth some form of conspiratorial view.This seems to be a new strategy running through the leftwing media. For a lack of reasonable opposition to the necessity for deep budget cuts, the journolistas have reconstituted two hackneyed issues in an attempt to discredit President Obama’s political opponents. The Left have fused questions about President Obama’s religious affiliation to the birth certificate issue in an effort to paint conservatives as conspiracy minded paranoids, but what is more disturbing about this strategy is that, sewn into the new approach, there is a subtle mix of McCarthy-era loyalty oath and Orwellian show trial.What Gregory is demanding is that Boehner perform the media’s function. It is the media’s responsibility to bring facts to the public, yet the mainstream media, as well as President Obama, have been truant in settling these questions. As author Stanley Kurtz has demonstrated, Obama is a demonstrated, serial liar on questions of his identity and beliefs — issues that the mainstream media have been unwilling to pursue.Hmmmm....Anyone wonder why?Read the full story here.

• HT:TheJerusalemConnection.The Koolaid of Interfaith Dialogue and the Clergy that Drinks It.By Rachel Lipsky. We’re Losing the Battle Against Islamism. Where is the principled leadership among Jewish and Christian clergy?One positive outcome to draw from Egypt’s crisis is the public’s elevated awareness about the Muslim Brotherhood. It is now clearer to many that the Brotherhood’s members are exploiting our open societies and political system right here in our own communities.The media’s role in deflating the Brotherhood’s dangerous agenda is profound. But other segments of our society are equally guilty. And so, to learn how steadily and consistently the West is losing to a totalitarian political doctrine, read this account. On the surface it may seem an insignificant episode, but assuming it is the model for interfaith or “twinning” devotees, it should be illuminating."Where Islamism starts, Interfaith Dialogue Stops".At the event, I wanted to share a quote from a document stating the mission of the Muslim Brotherhood in the U.S: “a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within [...].”To my dismay, as I was about to read the quote, the host, Rev. Yorty, wouldn’t allow me to do so, stating that he did not want to discuss politics. However, he and his cosponsor guest, Reform Rabbi Harry Rosenfeld, allowed other participants to defame Israel with impunity. For them, criticizing Israel did not seem to fall under the rubric of “discussing politics.”I left the room, not imagining that within weeks I would face these individuals with such low moral standing yet again.But on January 29th, two Muslim Brotherhood affiliate organizations — the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) and the Muslim Students Association (MSA) — invited and sponsored Imam Rauf as a keynote speaker at the University of Buffalo. And who do you think participated in the interfaith panel session along with Imam Rauf? You guessed correctly. The same Presbyterian Pastor Thomas Yorty and his cosponsor Rabbi Harry Rosenfeld, who joined Imam Rauf to discuss “how Americans of all faiths can work together for lasting peace.” They both spoke favorably of Imam Rauf and supported the work of MPAC. Overall, the interfaith session was devoid of any theological substance. Instead, the same superficial clichés often repeated during these events were offered yet again with petty statements like “We need to improve our knowledge of other people’s religions.” Of course, during the first event I tried to “improve our knowledge” of the political tenet of Islam, but to no avail. They sabotaged critical thinking and rejected any dissent from their rigid narrow-minded creed.In the QA last session with Imam Rauf, a question was asked about persecution of Christians in the Middle East. Pastor Yorty responded: “Christian persecution is not a topic I know much about.” If the pastor knows nothing about his fellow Christians (hundreds of thousands of murdered Christians in the past three decades), how can he be trusted on interfaith dialogue between Muslims and Christians?The rabbi’s response to the same question was that Christian persecution in the Middle East is NOT religiously oriented; rather, it’s all political. For example, he stated that Christians who left Beit Lechem did it because of “political fear.” Unfortunately, this stunning response was not followed with any evidence.Next, a question was asked about the rise of the new anti-Semitism. Rabbi Rosenfeld responded that “lousy economics” has been the reason for the hatred, assuring the mostly Muslim audience of some 150 individuals that anti-Semitism is currently “much less than ever before.” The rabbi also blamed the media for exaggerating anti-Semitism. Surely, the “rabbi” is unaware that his statement is strongly contradicted by the FBI, the CIA, and the U.S. State Department.The same Rabbi Rosenfeld showed no inhibition in mocking his political opponents. He referred to those who raise the alarm on the supremacist doctrine of Islam as “wacko” and “extremists” and even asked his embracing audience: “don’t you have to laugh at some of these people?” The rabbi’s partner, Pastor Yorty, used the word “haters” to describe opponents of his views.Hmmmm......What has become of religion?Only Ten Commandments and they can't follow them.Read the full story here.

• HT:TheAmericanDream.Debt, Debt, Debt – 15 Facts About U.S. Government Finances That Are Almost Too Crazy To Believe.If your family started spending nearly twice as much as it brought in every single year, how long do you think it would be before your family was completely and totally broke? Well, that is essentially what the federal government is doing. The U.S. government is so deep in debt at this point that it is hard to even try to describe it. Where do you even begin? Trying to put the vastness of U.S. government debt into words is kind of like trying to describe a great work of art by Michelangelo to a blind person. This year the U.S. government is going to go 1.645 trillion more dollars into debt. How can one possibly accurately convey just how large that amount of money really is? If you went out today and started spending one dollar every single second, it would take you over 31,000 years to spend one trillion dollars. Who can even comprehend such an amount? The U.S. government has mismanaged our finances so badly that it is hard to believe. We have sold our children and our grandchildren into perpetual debt slavery and not that many people really seem very upset about it. It is as if most of the nation is in a massive state of denial.Read over the 15 statistics below and really try to absorb them. It is imperative that we all try to understand how deep a hole we are in. This is the legacy of the Federal Reserve system. You see, people are not upset about the Federal Reserve just because they needed a new hobby. The truth is that the Federal Reserve system has transformed the wealthiest, most prosperous people on the planet into a horde of debt slaves. The American people are now saddled with the biggest debt in the history of the world, and the really sad thing is that it never had to turn out this way.But this is the end result of turning control of our currency and of our financial system over to the international bankers. Once we did that, it was only a matter of time until the U.S. government was drowning in debt.Thomas Jefferson desperately tried to warn us about central banks. He believed that for the government to borrow money in one generation which must be paid back by future generations is equivalent to stealing....Hmmmm......How long left before the Caliph grabs power and lets you work as slaves to pay off your debt?Read the full story here.

• HT:IMRA.The Plagues of Egypt - by Dr. Mordechai Kedar.In Egypt, there is almost no social contract to govern the conduct of its citizens – as there is in democratic societies. The norm, then, is to behave without inhibition, and violent confrontation is usually the standard response to conflict. With Mubarak out of the picture, and with the behavior of democratic society not yet learned, it seems likely that in the near term Egypt will be a society plagued by political intrigue and instability – providing alarming headlines almost daily. The governments of the world must be alert and vigilant for developments that could threaten the Suez Canal, the peace with Israel and regional stability.I was once told by an Egyptian friend – a wise diplomat who served at the Egyptian embassy in Israel for several years – that democracy is in fact a strict dictatorship, since each citizen is his own dictator. The citizen in a democracy imposes upon himself a strict etiquette: not to push; not to steal; not to harass women and girls; not to harm or insult others; to stop at a red light, even if it is three o'clock in the morning; not to cheat in business; to hold the door open for the person behind you; to stand in line; not to behave in a socially unacceptable manner; and other such dos and don'ts which the citizen in a democratic society feels obligated to abide by at every moment. He upholds these rules not out of fear of the regime (which is in no way intimidating), but out of self-discipline and conviction that only thus can a society run smoothly.Thus, a democratic society is one that is based upon the self-restraint of its citizens, and this self-restraint allows society to live a life of freedom and comfort. In Israel, said my Egyptian friend, there exists an unwritten "contract" between all citizens, which sets the rules of conduct in all areas of life: in the street, on the road, in economics, in politics and in the family.The Muslim Brotherhood have now demanded a repeat of the elections for the Legislative Council (Majlis a-Sha'b), held last November, whose results were clearly "fixed" by Mubarak's regime. The Brotherhood won only one seat out of 454, when their electoral strength might have earned them over half the seats. If the army responds to their demands and holds fair elections, we might see an Egyptian parliament with an Islamic majority, such as in Turkey, which will appoint a government with an Islamist agenda. An Islamist president elected in fair elections together with an Islamist parliament might change the constitution to prevent the passing of the country into secular hands, as was done in Iran after the 1979 Islamist revolution.The coming period could indeed be one of social and political unrest in Egypt, with governments rising and falling, an elected parliament unable to function, a military refraining from taking power despite its authority to do so and politicians forming and rapidly changing allies within a short period. We may also witness a series of political assassinations, as the quarreling camps seek ascendancy.This situation of unrest could awaken within many Egyptians the wish to bring to Egypt a strong and dependable figure, with a clear, unwavering agenda. The choice will probably be one of the leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood, such as Sheikh Dr. Yusuf al-Qaradawi. Al-Qaradawi is a celebrated Egyptian in the Arab and Muslim world, an eloquent speaker, well-read and knowledgeable, and a practically-permanent guest on the "Shari'a and Life" program on Aljazeera TV. Already this past weekend, he was back preaching in Cairo, and could yet be called upon to rescue Egypt from chaos, leading the country in the Islamist direction.In the near term, then, Egypt will likely be a society plagued by a whirlpool of political intrigue and instability – providing alarming headlines almost daily. The governments of the world must be alert and vigilant for developments that could threaten the Suez Canal, the peace with Israel and regional stability.Hmmmm.....Special thanks to Pres Barrack Hussein Obama for making this possible.Read the full story here.

• Muslim Barclays bank manager 'helped fraudsters steal more than £820,000 from pensioner's nest egg'.A personal banker helped fraudsters steal more than £820,000 from a pensioner’s ‘nest egg’, a court heard.Mohammed Ahmed, 26, first made unauthorised changes to the savings account set up by 75-year-old Brian Mahoney, it is claimed.He then transferred all but £80,000 out of the retirement fund with Barclays, jurors were told.Mr Mahoney, from Cheshunt, Herts, only found out when he rang the bank two months later to check how much interest he was receiving.He told the Old Bailey he set up the Nest-egg savings account in October 2008 with a payment of £1m because of the banking crisis.‘Everyone was moving money, and I was looking for the best terms obviously.‘Until I went to phone up to get the balance I didn’t realise.’ He did not touch the account other than to transfer £100,000 to his daughter, the court heard.But Ahmed made repeated and unnecessary checks of the account in the period leading up to February 2009, it is claimed.Ahmed was arrested after Mr Mahoney alerted the bank in May 2009 and denied any fraud.Hmmmm....the Djini did it?Read the full story here.