MFS - The Other News

                       Morning Posting.

• Japan : For the most accurate info on the nuclear disaster go to : Paul Langley's Nuclear History Blog.Here.

• "Dreams of my father"?Revealed: Barack Obama's 'playboy' father planned to have future president ADOPTED.(DailyMail).President Barack Obama's father made plans to have the future president adopted, astonishing new documents have revealed.When his 18-year-old wife, Ann Dunham, was five months pregnant, the elder Mr Obama told immigration officials they planned to give the baby away to the Salvation Army.Then a student at the University of Hawaii, immigration officials were investigating him because they believed he had more than one wife - and had already been warned about his 'playboy ways'.The revelation comes just months after the president finally put to rest claims he was not a U.S. citizen by releasing his full birth certificate.In an interview to renew his visa in 1961, Mr Obama's father, then 24, insisted he had divorced his wife at home in Kenya before marrying Miss Dunham, who was pregnant with his child.It reads: 'Subject got his USC [U.S. citizen] wife ‘Hapai’ [Hawaiian for pregnant] and although they were married they do not live together and Miss Dunham is making arrangements with the Salvation Army to give the baby away.'As history attests, the couple kept the baby, but the revelation gives a fascinating glimpse into Mr Obama's relationship with his father, who he barely saw when he was growing up.As an 18-year-old student married to a black man in 1960s America, Miss Dunham may have come under pressure to give her child away.Although mixed-race marriage was legal in Hawaii, it was banned in 22 states, and in many of those it was a felony.In his memoir, Dreams From My Father, the president himself wrote that his mother might have thought about putting him up for adoption.Even in big cities, he said, 'the hostile stares, the whispers, might have driven a woman in my mother’s predicament into a back-alley abortion - or at the very least to a distant convent that could arrange for adoption.'It could have been an attractive option for his father. Despite claiming he was divorced, he was still married to his first wife - with whom he had two children - and he was struggling financially to support them.The memo was written in April 1961 by Lyle H. Dahling, an administrator in the Honolulu office of the then-U.S. Immigration and Naturalisation Service, his father.It has only now been released after a Freedom of Information request from a biographer writing about Mr Obama's father.It is not clear whether the young couple made definite plans to put a young Barack up for adoption, or whether his father made the story up to placate immigration officials and help him secure a visa.When students applied to extend their stay in the U.S., officials would take into account their academic and behavioural record.Being a bigamist with a young baby would hardly impress the authorities - although he claimed to have divorced his first wife, in fact they were still married, and he was supporting two children at home in Kenya.The documents revealed immigration officials even considered charging with bigamy so they could deport him.In the end, Mr Dahling settled on monitoring his behaviour rather than bringing charges.The memo reads: 'Mrs McCabe [the university's foreign student adviser] further states that [Obama] has been running around with several girls since he first arrived here and last summer she cautioned him about his playboy ways. '[Obama] replied that he would "try" to stay away from the girls.'Family members on both sides have said had never heard any discussion of adoption.According to former White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, the president had never been told his mother had thought about giving him away.He added that the White House had not tried to discover whether Miss Dunham had ever made arrangements with the Salvation Army, because Mr Obama 'is absolutely convinced that she did not'.Of Mr Obama's claim to immigration, he told the Boston Globe: 'He was trying to convince immigration to let him stay. 'So, part of his effort was to convince immigration that some of the responsibilities that he had he would not continue to have.’But while Mr Obama's father seems to have considered adoption, relatives of his mother say they never heard her speak about it.Charles Payne, Miss Dunham's maternal uncle, said: 'I never heard any talk of adoption whatsoever. 'Ann decided she had done this and this was her child and she was going to take care of him.'From day one, as far as I could tell, she and Madelyn [Dunham] and Stanley [Dunham] were all completely committed to Barack.'Just two years after his son was born, Mr Obama left his family in Hawaii and moved to Harvard, where he married for a third time.Hmmmm..........Read the full 'story' here.

• Top local democrat Milton Ohlsen III was indicted today for planting a bomb in a parking garage that injured a local attorney.(BigGovernment).A former Democratic political operative has been indicted by federal authorities for allegedly planting a bomb in a Clayton parking garage in 2008. The bomb went off, seriously injuring a Clayton attorney. Police believe he was not the bomber’s intended target.Milton Ohlsen iii nicknamed “Skip” is well known to law enforcement. He’s also well known in Democratic political circles. The feds now say he’s the one who planted a bomb in a garage at 190 Carondolet plaza in Clayton on October 15, 2008.Federal prosecutors say ohlsen made the bomb and put it in the parking garage where it went off and injured clayton attorney John Gillis.Federal agents say Gillis was the wrong target. They say Ohlsen was actually trying to kill attorney Richard Eisen who drove a similar car. Eisen represented Ohlsen’s wife in a messy divorce case.Starting in 2004 Ohlsen was used as a consultant by the Missouri Democratic party. He even had lunch at the governor’s mansion with then-governor Bob Holden.The bombing victim John L. Gillis said he was doing “reasonably well” after receiving a series of skin grafts to treat burns caused by the bombing.Hmmmm......."Domestic terrorisme"?Read the full story here.

• Obama’s terrorist ‘catch and release’ policy.(WashingtonPost).By Marc A. Thiessen.This morning The Post reports that a Somali terrorist named Ahmed Abdulkadir Warsame was held and interrogated on a Navy ship for more than two months before being flown to New York to stand trial. The Post reports this morning that he “is the first foreign terrorism suspect captured by the administration outside the United States and moved to this country for trial.” This news comes a week after Vice Adm. William McRaven told the Senate Armed Services Committee that the Obama administration has no clear plan for handling captured terrorist leaders if they are caught alive outside the war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq. McRaven testified that that “in many cases” suspects captured in secret are taken to a U.S. Navy ship until they can be tried in a U.S. court or transferred to the custody of an allied country, but if neither option is feasible, he said, the terrorist is let go. “If we can’t do either one of those, then we will release that individual,” McRaven told the committee.Which leaves the obvious question: If Warsame is the first suspect to be transferred to the United States for trial, what happened to the others?The United States’ top special operations commander told Congress that because the United States has no place to hold captured terrorists we have simply been letting them go. In his testimony, Adm. McRaven used the phrase “in many cases,” which seems to indicate that not only has this happened, but it has happened in numerous instances. Well, exactly how many al-Qaeda terrorists have been taken into U.S. custody on Navy ships and released by the Obama administration? Who are these terrorists? Where were they captured? Who decided to release them? Where were they released? And what has become of them since?Until now, it was believed that the administration was not capturing senior terrorists alive outside the war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq, but simply killing them. Last year, The Post reported that there had been no known high-value detentions by the United States since Obama took office. Now, it appears, we have indeed been capturing such terrorists — and setting them free. If so, this is an outrage. With Adm. McRaven’s testimony, and today’s news, the administration owes the American people — and the United States Congress — some answers, and fast.Hmmmmm........"I will stand with my Muslim Brothers"?Read the full story here.

• TSA....Airport agent 'took passenger's iPad and stuffed it down his trousers'... and stole $50,000 worth of devices from luggage.(DailyMail).The list of consumer complaints against the TSA over recent months may soon have to include theft, in addition to groping and racial profiling.That's because a Transportation Security Administration worker has been charged with two counts of grand theft for allegedly stealing electronics out of passengers' luggage, authorities in Florida said Thursday. According to the Broward County Sheriff's Office, Nelson Santiago-Serrano, 30, was caught by a Continental Airlines employee stealing an iPad from a suitcase in Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport's Terminal 1 on Monday.Mr Santiago-Serrano was allegedly seen trying to stuff the device into his pants, reports the Broward-Palm Beach New Times.Police say that after they arrested him on Monday, he admitted to stealing computers, GPS devices, video cameras, and other electronics from bags he was supposed to be screening. Cops say Mr Santiago-Serrano would then take pictures of the items, then list them for sale online. They say many of the items would be sold before he even finished his shift at the airport. Detectives claim he stole an estimated $50,000 from fliers over the past six months.Police are asking people to come forward if they think they had something stolen, but they say chances of actually recovering the goods are not good.Mr Santiago-Serrano was released on a $4,000 bond Tuesday, though police say they may file additional charges against him soon.According to the Broward County clerk of courts, he does not have a lawyer or any scheduled court dates.He reportedly no longer works for the TSA, though he had started with the agency in January 2009. Recently, allegations had surfaced that TSA agents in Newark airport had engaged in racial profiling of passengers, by singling out Hispanic men for additional screening.One agent was disciplined and others received training after colleagues accused them of acting as 'Mexican hunters'.Hmmmmm.......Read the full story here.

• Center for Security Policy Urges Rejection of Proposed $700 Billion in Defense Cuts.(TrevorLoudon).Washington, DC; July 7, 2011: Media reports today indicate that national security spending could be cut by as much as $700 billion as part of a deal on the debt limit – almost twice the amount originally proposed by President Obama.The Center for Security Policy believes such cuts are antithetical to the time-tested practice President Reagan called “Peace through Strength.” It is the height of irresponsibility to commit to reductions of that magnitude without a proper analysis of how they would be apportioned and to what effect. That would be true in a world less perilous than today’s; it will be even more true if, as has been the case in the past, massive Pentagon defunding of this kind invites aggression by the myriad dangerous foes whose emergence will make tomorrow’s even more perilous.In response to the proposed $700 billion in cuts, Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., President of the Center for Security Policy remarked:

President Obama’s own Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, warned that $400 billion slashed from Pentagon funding over the next 12 years could result in ‘in a hollowing out of the force from a lack of proper training, maintenance and equipment and manpower.’ That being the case, it is safe to say that $700 billion in cuts over the same time period would be simply disastrous — significantly diminishing America’s ability to defend itself, while emboldening its enemies.Treating investments in national defense as indistinguishable from lower priority types of government spending invites otherwise avoidable wars – whose costs in national treasure and, more importantly, in lives needlessly lost would make the problem of today’s national debt pale by comparison. America’s deficit is surely a cause for concern. But it cannot be safely alleviated by actions that have the effect of undercutting the national security and jeopardizing the safety of the American people.Hundreds of useless, even counterproductive US Government agencies will take few, if any cuts.But the one Department that keeps Americans safe from their enemies, will likely be gutted under leftist Defense Secretary Leon Panetta – former friend of life long communist Hugh DeLacy.Why do you think that might be?Hmmmm......If he wanted to destroy america would he do anything different?Read the full story here.

• Obama administration appeasing Turkey and Russia, giving the keys for US defence to Turkey..(WashingtonTimes).The Obama administration is about to make another concession to Russia on missile defense by concluding an agreement with Turkey to base a radar there that would monitor Iranian missile launches.The deal is raising questions about whether the administration gave in to a Turkish demand that no missile-tracking data from the radar be shared with Israel or other non-NATO members. The demand was based on the Turkish government’s increasing Islamist and pro-Iranian policies.The TPY-2 radar deal has been under discussion for the past year and goes against a plan by the George W. Bush administration to place a radar in one of two former Soviet republics, Georgia or Azerbaijan.Moscow opposed putting the radar in those states, claiming it would threaten Russia’s nuclear missile forces.Earlier concessions by the Obama administration included canceling plans to deploy 10 long-range missile interceptors in Poland in favor of its less-capable “phased adaptive approach” that relies on untested missile defense systems, specifically a future long-range version of the Navy’s SM-3 interceptor.A senior U.S. national security official said the Turkish agreement for the radar is expected to be completed in the next week.“It’s yet another concession to the Russians,” the official said. A second official said conclusion of deal was imminent.Also, placing the radar in Turkey will provide less capability against a future Iranian long-range missile targeted against the United States, the first official said.State Department spokesman Mark Toner said discussions on a forward-based radar have been under way for sometime.Mr. Toner said the phased adaptive approach missile defense is “not about Russia.”The misslie defense progam “is a better system that will provide fuller protection to our NATO allies and the United States and it will do sooner than the previous system.”William Burns, nominee to be deputy secretary of state, was asked last week if he thought Israel should be blocked from using the TPY-2 radar data, as Turkey suggested in conditioning its role in NATO missile defenses.Mr. Burns did not answer directly. He replied that the phased adaptive approach and NATO missile defenses “are for the defense of NATO and Europe.” He said the Pentagon has “separate and robust missile defense cooperative efforts with Israel.”“The United States has stated consistently that it reserves the right to use information from U.S. sensors in whatever ways it deems necessary,” Mr. Burns said in response to written questions posed by Sen. Mark Kirk, Illinois Republican, as part of the nomination process.A Turkish Embassy spokeswoman had no immediate comment.A classified Jan. 26, 2010, State Department cable said the Turkish government was still debating how to respond to U.S. requests to put the radar and possibly other missile defenses in Turkey.The cable, made public by the anti-secrecy site WikiLeaks, said Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan had told President Obama that “such a system must be implemented in a NATO context to diminish the political cost that his government will likely bear, both in terms of domestic politics and in Turkey’s relations with Iran.”“Erdogan is concerned that Turkey’s participation might later give Israel protection from an Iranian counterstrike,” said the cable, labeled “secret.”The Czech Republic recently pulled out of plans to host a missile early-warning radar as part of the administration’s program. Prague officials claimed their participation was rejected because the system would have provided data on missile attacks but was not connected to interceptors that could shoot them down.In February, four Republican senators wrote to Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates urging him to put the radar in Georgia instead of Turkey.“We believe the U.S. should deploy the most effective missile defenses possible — in partnership with our allies — that provide for protection for the U.S. homeland, our deployed forces and our allies,” said the letter by Sens. Jon Kyl of Arizona, James E. Risch of Idaho, James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma and Mr. Kirk.Hmmmmm..........."I will stand with my Muslim Brothers "?No wonder Obama has weekly phonecalls with Erdogan?Read the full story here.

• President Obama faith adviser, Eboo Patel Speaks Alongside Defender of WTC Bombers.(Vinienco).President Obama’s faith adviser, Eboo Patel, spoke this past weekend at the main event of a three-day convention held by the Muslim Students Association, or MSA, a controversial group founded by the Muslim Brotherhood. Patel appeared on a panel alongside Tariq Ramadan, grandson of the notorious founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, and Siraj Wahhaj, who was named as a possible co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Wahhaj has also defended the convicted WTC bomb plotters and has urged the Islamic takeover of America.The MSA event was part of a larger weekend convention in which several U.S. Islamic groups held a series of speaking engagements. The convention was arranged by the Islamic Society of North America, itself an unindicted co-conspirator in a scheme to raise money for Hamas. Patel was featured on a panel at what was billed as the “main session” of both the MSA and ISNA conventions. The session was titled “I took the Road Less Traveled by, and that has made all the Difference.”A description of the panel on the ISNA website states, “We live in a society in which immersion is encouraged and in which we are often confronted with evil. Muslims have always been challenged, but Islam is a guiding star that can help us overcome these challenges as we strive to remain faithful. We must remain confident and unified as we make our short journey through this life. And sometimes, we must be ‘strangers.’”Panel participants with Patel were Ramadan, Wahhaj and Islamic author Yasir Qadhi. Ramadan’s maternal grandfather was Hasan al-Banna, who in 1928 founded the Muslim Brotherhood. Osama bin Laden routinely referred to al-Banna in al-Qaida doctrine. Ramadan’s father, Said Ramadan, led the Brotherhood throughout the 1950s and then was exiled from Egypt to Switzerland.Wahhaj is an African American convert to Islam via the Nation of Islam.He repeatedly has urged the U.S. to accept Islamic law. Discover the Networks notes Wahhaj in 1991 predicted America will fall unless it “accepts the Islamic agenda.”The next year, he stated, “Hear what I’m telling you well. The Americans are not your friends … The Canadians are not your friends. … The Europeans are not your friends. Your friend is Allah, the Messenger and those who believe.”Also, in a 1992 address to an audience of Muslims in New Jersey, Wahhaj expressed his desire to replace the U.S. government with an Islamic caliphat“If we were united and strong,” Wahhaj said, “we’d elect our own emir (leader) and give allegiance to him. … [T]ake my word, if 6-8 million Muslims unite in America, the country will come to us.”In 1995, Wahhaj was named by U.S. Attorney Mary Jo White as a possible co-conspirator to the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center. He objected to that designation, noting in his defense that he had eaten “dinner with Secretary of State [Madeleine] Albright – after the list” of co-conspirators had been released.Discover the Networks notes in the summer of 1999, Wahhaj testified as a character witness for convicted terror mastermind Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman. Wahhaj stated, on the record, that he considered it an honor to have had an opportunity to host Abdel-Rahman at his mosque, describing the latter as a “respected scholar … bold … [and] a strong preacher of Islam.”

‘Burn down master’s house’

 Both the ISNA and the MSA, meanwhile, have sordid histories of their own.The MSA was established mainly by members of the Muslim Brotherhood in 1963. In January, Amir Abdel Malik-Ali, keynote speaker at the MSA’s West Regional Conference, recited the MSA “pledge of allegiance,” which is a direct adoption of the Muslim Brotherhood’s own credo.The MSA pledge states: “Allah is my lord. Islam is my life. The Koran is my guide. The Sunna is my practice. Jihad is my spirit. Righteousness is my character. Paradise is my goal. I enjoin what is right. I forbid what is wrong. I will fight against oppression. And I will die to establish Islam.”WND previously attended an MSA event at which violence against the U.S. was urged by speakers.“We are not Americans,” shouted one speaker, Muhammad Faheed, at QueensboroughCommunity College in 2003. “We are Muslims. [The U.S.] is going to deport and attack us! It is us versus them! Truth against falsehood! The colonizers and masters against the oppressed, and we will burn down the master’s house!”The MSA in 1981 founded the Islamic Society of North America.ISNA was named in a May 1991 Muslim Brotherhood document – “An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America” – as one of the Brotherhood’s likeminded “organizations of our friends” who shared the common goal of destroying America and turning it into a Muslim nation, according to Discover the Networks.In December 2003, U.S. Sens. Charles Grassley and Max Baucus of the Senate Committee on Finance listed ISNA as one of 25 American Muslim organizations that “finance terrorism and perpetuate violence.”The U.S. government released a list of approximately 300 unindicted co-conspirators” and “joint venturers” in the 2007 Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development trial, the largest terrorist financing scheme in American history, in which the groups were accused of raising money for Hamas.Islam scholar Stephen Schwartz describes ISNA as “one of the chief conduits through which the radical Saudi form of Islam passes into the United States.”According to terrorism expert Steven Emerson, ISNA “is a radical group hiding under a false veneer of moderation” that publishes a bimonthly magazine, Islamic Horizons, that “often champions militant Islamist doctrine.” The group also “convenes annual conferences where Islamist militants have been given a platform to incite violence and promote hatred,” states Emerson. Emerson cites an ISNA conference in which Muslim Brotherhood official Yusuf Al Qaradhawi was invited to speak.In February, Obama named Patel, a Chicago Muslim, to his Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships.

U.S. ‘ideal place for renewal of Islam’

Patel is the founder and executive director of Chicago-based Interfaith Youth Core, which says it promotes pluralism by teaming people of different faiths on service projects.Patel is himself tied to ISNA, having spoken and several ISNA events, including the convention this past weekend.Patel is listed on ISNA’s official speakers bureau.Based on his own comments, Patel apparently is a member of ISNA. Upon the August 2007 election of the group’s president, Ingrid Mattson, Patel told USA Today, “I’m proud to have her elected as my president.”Another ISNA speaker is Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the controversial Muslim leader behind the plan to build the Islamic center and mosque two blocks from Ground Zero.WND reported, Patel has close ties to Rauf. The two have been documented together discussing America as “the ideal place for a renewal of Islam.”Rauf wrote a book in 2004 that had two different titles, one in English and the second in Arabic. In the U.S., his book was called “What’s right with America is what’s right with Islam.”The same book, published in Arabic, bore the name “The Call From the WTC Rubble: Islamic Da’wah From the Heart of America Post-Sept. 11.”It has emerged that the Arabic edition of Rauf’s book was produced, with Feisal’s cooperation, by ISNA.Rauf, meanwhile, wrote the afterword to Patel’s 2006 book “Building the Interfaith Youth Movement: Beyond Dialogue to Action.”Patel is listed as one of 15 “Muslim Leaders of Tomorrow” on the website of the American Society for Muslim Advancement, which is led by Rauf.Patel, meanwhile, has been caught in a series of controversial remarks about the U.S.WND reported Patel declared that everything he was taught about Christopher Columbus, Thomas Jefferson and American “fairness” and “equality” was wrong.WND also reported Patel blasted what he called the “myths” of America – describing them as beliefs that the country is “a land of freedom and equality and justice.”Patel has talked about “rage” he felt against the U.S. after claiming to experience prejudice in the country.Patel stated the faith movement gave him a “way to have a radical view of the world – radical equality, radical peace, radical possibility – that is love-based, not anger-based.”He wrote that had he been around in the 1960s, he may have joined William Ayers’ anti-American Weather Underground terrorist group.Hmmmm.......Some "Faith adviser"!Don't worry once the elections come closer Obama will go back to church.Read the full story here.

• We can have a Ground Zero Mosque, but not a memorial that actually memorializes 9/11.(WashingtonTimes).This Sept. 11, the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks upon America, New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg will dedicate the massive, $600 million National September 11 Memorial and Museum at the World Trade Center. What Americans have not been told is that this “memorial” will remake Ground Zero so that it does not acknowledge 9/11.Instead of acting as a constant reminder of the attacks, a symbol for us and future generations of the evil that struck, the death and destruction it caused and the heroism and sacrifice in response, the memorial will wipe out all evidence and memory of the attacks.Replacing all reminders of the attacks will be two immense “voids” with gigantic subterranean waterfalls designed to express exclusively, as per architect Michael Arad, the continuing “absence in our lives caused by these deaths.”About 500 trees will be planted upon the site. They are, we are told by memorial officials, “traditional symbols of the rejuvenation of life.” They also will eradicate all trace and memory of what stood there for 30 years and its destruction on Sept. 11.The cause of “these deaths,” how these people came to be absent - that is, 9/11 - has been deemed irrelevant and even contrary to your memorial “experience.”The memorial is not about that; it’s about you.Cities and towns across America have humbly requested a segment of the twisted steel of the WTC to feature in their own modest Sept. 11 memorials. The only memorial where one is not welcome is the “national” memorial at Ground Zero. Those iconic remnants, exactly because they are iconic, are considered far too gauche for the jury of intellectuals and artists who chose the design.The National September 11 Memorial at the WTC will not include the iconic WTC “Sphere” - again, exactly because it is iconic. “The Sphere” stood in the center of the WTC plaza for 30 years as a symbol of world peace. On 9/11, though badly damaged (a piece of one of the planes tore through it) it survived the attacks in place and was embraced by many Americans as a symbol of the nation’s strength and resiliency.That is why it cannot be returned.It sits at Battery Park, about a half-mile from Ground Zero, where it was installed March 11, 2002, the six-month anniversary of the attacks, as a “temporary” memorial. Battery Park is undergoing its own renovations, and “The Sphere” will have to moved.One 9/11 anniversary at Ground Zero, Mr. Arad told me that returning “The Sphere” would be “didactic.” That is, it would tell us what to think.Somehow disposing of it is not telling us what to think.This is like banishing the USS Arizona from the USS Arizona Memorial.Read the full story here.

• US Congress votes in favor of PA aid suspension.(Ynet).US House of Representatives backs proposal that will see aid to PA suspended should it pursue unilateral statehood bid in UN. A week after the Senate approved a similar proposal; the US House of Representatives on Thursday overwhelmingly backed the idea of suspending aid to the Palestinian Authority if it continues to refuse a negotiated settlement to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. They also rejected Palestinian pursuit of statehood through the United Nations.The vote was 407-6 for the nonbinding resolution that also called on the Obama administration to consider suspending aid to the Palestinian Authority in light of the deal between the government and Hamas - considered a terrorist group by Israel and the US.The resolution said the goal was two states "a democratic, Jewish state of Israel and a viable, democratic Palestinian state, living side-by-side in peace, security and mutual recognition."The House had debated the measure on Wednesday but postponed the vote to ensure lawmakers had a chance to vote. Republicans and Democrats signaled their strong support for Israel and a resumption of direct negotiations that collapsed last fall."We stand by Israel as our most valued ally. It is time for the Palestinian Authority to accept a peaceful solution to this conflict," said House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va.Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland, the No. 2 Democrat in the House, said he strongly believed that to ensure "the long-term viability of the Jewish democratic state, peace must be negotiated. It cannot and will not be imposed from outside."The administration has said the Palestinian push for a UN vote on its statehood this fall has not helped the peace process, a point echoed by lawmakers."What, exactly, would UN General Assembly recognition of a Palestinian state do for the Palestinians? Absolutely nothing," said Rep. Howard Berman of California, the top Democrat on the Foreign Affairs Committee. "It would be seen by Israel and many others as an act of bad faith, creating yet another obstacle to successful talks."Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., the chairwoman of the committee, raised the prospect of cutting off aid."Continuing to provide assistance to the Palestinians - assistance amounting to $2.5 billion in the last 5 years alone - is certainly not the answer," she said.Hmmmmm..........A pitty they did not realise this ten years ago.Read the full story here.

• Russia calls on UN to redraw map of the Arctic to grab lion's share of untapped 90 BILLION barrels of oil.(DailyMail).The mineral-rich Arctic is at the centre of a new land grab by nations desperate to get their hands on its icy energy treasures - including 90 billion barrels of oil. Russia, Norway, the United States, Canada and Denmark all want a share of the seabed beneath the Arctic territory which is believed to also hold 30 per cent of the world's untapped gas resources, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.Now Russia has announced that it is to formally submit an application to the United Nations next year in the hope of redrawing the map of the Arctic, giving itself a bigger share of the resource-rich area.The plan follows a pledge last week to send troops and weapons to its icy north to guarantee and secure its Arctic interests.The formal application to the United Nations would change the region's borders and allow exploitation of the energy-rich Arctic territory.'I hope that next year we will present a formal, scientifically grounded application to the commission of the U.N.,' state-run RIA news agency quoted Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov as telling a government maritime board.Russia has said it will spend millions of dollars on studies to prove that an underwater mountain range rich in oil, natural gas and mineral deposits is part of its own Eurasian landmass. Canada and Denmark reject the claim, saying the geographical formation, known as the Lomonosov Ridge, which stretches across the Arctic Sea, is a geographical extension of their own land.Global warming has boosted expectations that the Arctic may provide new mining, fishing and shipping prospects as the ice cap melts.Russia submitted an application to the U.N. to claim the Lomonosov Ridge in 2001, but the document was returned and Moscow was asked to provide more proof for its claim.Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said late last month that Russia would finish its mapping of its Arctic shelf by 2013 and submit its application to the U.N. on its claim to the Lomonosov Ridge by 2014.Canada has said it will submit its application on the territory in 2013.The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea says that any coastal state can claim undersea territory 200 nautical miles from their shoreline and exploit the natural resources within that zone.Hmmmm......No word from Anti Oil exploration Comrade Obama.Read the full story here.

• Iran Publishes List of 26 U.S. Officials To Be Tried in Absentia.(Memri).Iran has published a list of 26 U.S. officials whom it intends to try in absentia for what it calls their crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. In addition, the Majlis has announced that Iran means to revoke all agreements and contracts with countries or private companies that have any economic ties with these 26 individuals. Following is the list, in the original English as published by the Iranian news agency Fars.

1. Former FBI Chief Director Thomas J. Pickard, for human rights violations, including his involvement in the 1993 siege on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, and the death of over 80 of the cult's followers. He is also wanted for human rights violations during his tenure as the CIA station chief in Afghanistan and Iraq in 2003.
2. Former commander of the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay Geoffrey D. Miller, who was the commander [of this prison] between 2002 and 2007, and has been charged with the torture of inmates.
3. Current Guantanamo commander Rear Admiral Jeffery [sic] Harbeson, for human rights violations at the detention center since 2010.
4. USS Vincennes Captain Will Rogers III, for the killing of 290 Iranian civilians onboard Iran Air Flight 655, which was shot down by the USS Vincennes on July 3, 1988.
5. Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who served in this post from 1975 to 1977 and from 2001 to 2006, for the killing of thousands of civilians in the US-led wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. He is also charged with [involvement in] human rights violations and torture at two notorious prisons, Abu Ghraib in Iraq and Bagram in Afghanistan.
6. Paul Bremer, the U.S. administrator in Iraq from May 2003 to June 2004.
7. General Tommy Franks, who led the U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.
8. Commander of the U.S. forces in Iraq Raymond Odierno, for his major role in the massive violation of human rights in Iraq.
9. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, commander of the U.S. troops in charge of torturing prisoners in Abu Ghraib, for human rights violations and for his role in U.S. state-sponsored terrorism.
10. Former U.S. Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz for his role in the crimes committed against the Afghan and Iraqi people.
11. Gen. John McKean, former U.S. Deputy Chief of Staff, for his role in massacring civilians, torturing prisoners in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, and violating human rights in Afghanistan and Iraq.
12. The United States' first administrator in Iraq in 2003, charged with human rights violations and the massacre of civilians in Iraq.
13. U.S. Defense Department official Richard Pearl [sic], for his role in planning the military invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq and the crimes committed by the U.S. troops in these two war-torn states.
14. Richard A. Cody, Deputy Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army in 2003, for complicity in the massacre of civilians, torture of prisoners in Abu-Ghraib and Guantanamo, and violation of human rights in Iraq and Afghanistan.
15. Gen. James Mathews [sic], commander of the U.S. operations in Iraq, for his role in the 2003 massacre of civilians in Fallujah, Iraq, and his involvement in crimes against humanity.
16. Gen. George Casey, the Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army from 2003 to 2007, for his complicity in the massacre of the civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan, the raiding and occupation of the Iranian consulate in the city of Erbil in northern Iraq, and the illegal arrest, abduction and torturing of five Iranian diplomats for over 2.5 years.
17. Gen. David Petraeus, former commander of the U.S. troops in Iraq and commander of the U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, for massive violation of human rights, massacre of civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as complicity in drug-trafficking.
18. Gen. Janis Karbinsky [sic], former commander of Abu-Ghraib prison and former officer responsible for U.S. prisons in Iraq, for torturing prisoners and massive violation of human rights in Iraq.
19. Gen. Steve Casbon [sic], Abu-Ghraib Prison official, for torturing prisoners and massive violation of human rights in Iraq.
20. Gen. Stanley McCrystal [sic], commander of the U.S. troops in Afghanistan, for massacre of civilians, torture of prisoners in Bagram, violation of human rights and complicity in drug-trafficking.
21. Gen. Jack Bridgez [sic], Commander of the U.S. Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, for his role in providing logistic backup and training for the anti-Iranian terrorist group Jundollah, and for supporting terrorism, massacring civilians, and [committing] massive human rights violations in Afghanistan.
22. Luis [sic] Freeh, former CIA Chief, for human rights violations, and complicity in the torture of prisoners in Afghanistan and Iraq.
23. Robert Muller [sic], former CIA Chief, for human rights violations, and complicity in the torture of prisoners in Afghanistan and Iraq.
24. Gen. James Jones, former national security advisor to the U.S. president, for his support of terrorism, especially the anti-Iranian terrorist organization Mojahedin-e Khalq (MKO), and for aiding terrorist groups in Afghanistan and Iraq.
25. Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker, former chief of staff of the U.S. Army in 2007, for his role in the massacre of civilians, torture of prisoners in Guantanamo and Bagram, and human rights violations in Afghanistan and Iraq.
26. Stuart A. Levey, the incumbent and first Undersecretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence in the United States Treasury Department, for his role in the violating human rights by imposing illegal sanctions on the Iranian people."Hmmmm......." Iran means to revoke all agreements and contracts with countries or private companies that have any economic ties with these 26 individuals. Does this mean Turkey also?Source .

• Canada Faces Islamist Menace – A Young Muslim’s Admirable Warning.(Ross'sRightAngle).Natasha Fatah, a young Muslim lady in Canada, had an excellent article in Wednesday’s Globe and Mail, warning us of the menace to Canada presented by Islamists.She begins by telling of her own parents.

My parents left behind Pakistan and chose Canada for the same reasons many other Muslim immigrants came here 20, 30 or 40 years ago: for democracy, freedom, stability and modernity. And herein lies a common misconception amongst “mainstream” Canadians: They’re convinced that, in the average Muslim household, it’s the parent who represents conservatism and tradition, and the Canadian-born children who are modern and fighting against this oppression. This is a falsehood. Many of our parents, who immigrated here from Muslim countries in South Asia, the Middle East and North Africa, did so specifically out of their respect for Western values. Elder Muslims may be modest and socially conservative in their personal lives. But, by and large, the parents in Muslim-Canadian households believe in the core values of this society.Well, I have always hoped this was the case. It seems a brainless thing to do, emigrating from a backward sharia sty to a civilised country, if you actually want to live in a backward sharia sty.Mind you, I’m not sure many older immigrants of any creed realise that Canada has been going downhill in terms of civilised values, for years, ever since Turdeau.Gay marriage, suppression of free speech, soft-on-crime policies, and the other depraved trappings of a PC society, are unattractive to mature people, although immature persons, of any age, find the PC morass appealing. Lots of good immigrants, and having canvassed during elections here and there, I know this to be true, have no time for the revolting ‘progressive’ agenda – they’re good citizens. Brown, black, yellow or white, we could do with more of them. Taking a few of Indonesia’s persecuted Ahmadis would be no bad idea.However, Ms. Fatah quickly moves to the nub of the problem, the way too many young aliens – and I use the term not in relationship to citizen status but to the fact that the individulas we are about to discuss are not Canadian in any real sense, any more than that nasty little terrorist, Omar Khadr was it, imported from Gitmo, and most of his kin, are Canadian. They’re not. They are enemies of the West. And as Ms. Fatah explains, they are not alone.It’s their children – in desperate need for identity – who have turned to conservative, hard-line and politicized Islam for the answers. This trend to embrace a politicized Islam has led to bloodshed in many parts of the world and is growing rapidly – and going unchecked – in Canada.But, as most young hijabis will defiantly tell you, “it’s my choice to cover my hair.” If they’re making that choice for themselves, then it’s a choice their mothers from India, Turkey and Uganda rejected.Fatah tells us that she has ‘spoken to many parents in the Pakistani and Somali communities who’ve “lost” their children to the jihad….She hits the nail on the head when she says clearly that there’s a difference between Islam and Islamism. Islam is a religion, a faith, as beautiful and as flawed as any other, which can be practised as liberally or as conservatively as we choose. Islamism, however, is a doctrine that uses Islam as political ideology, mandating sharia law, armed jihad against all non-Muslims and, ultimately, a domination of Islamism over the West. It’s this Islamism that’s seizing young Muslims.And it’s that Islamism which should see them deported as fast as possible. I doubt she would agree with me, but that’s the most effective antidote to the poison afflicting sharia-freaks. They have grown up in Canada, forcefully reject Western values, and should therefore be sent packing, to give them a chance to live amongs savages.What else would we do with people like those she describes in her account of her experience in a university’s (two universities’) ’Muslim students associations. I was told to sit behind the men, not next to them. That it would be better if I covered my hair. That sharia is the optimal way to resolve personal, legal and political issues. I was even told that, when filling out a form, the ink from my pen should not touch the ink of a “brother’s” pen. ‘Obviously these sharia-freaks are border-line psychos, and if we don’t expel them, then a spell of in-patient treatment at a mental hospital needs thinking about. But that costs a lot of tax-payers’ money, of which the nauseating fanatics have had plenty already, school and college wasted on such barbaric young slugs.Why can’t they be just a little bit grateful for what Canada has given them, or at least intelligent enough to recignise, as Faatah does, that there was no golden age of Islam (that) they’d like to bring back to Canada, a golden age that could bring us all into the Dark Ages….If only more immigrants and their off-spring shared her view that ‘Islam is the religion I practise and the reason I wanted to join the Muslim students association. Islamism is the ideology spreading throughout our campuses, and the reason I left the group.’And I’d also have to write about many more subjects. I’d be quite happy to do so, but for the foreseeable future, until Western Governments are forced to awaken to the need for strong steps, I’d best be getting on with it.Regardless of what other Canadians think of them, it’s getting harder to ignore Islam, and young Muslims, in Canada. Islam is Canada’s fastest-growing major religion. According to a Statistics Canada estimate, the Muslim population will soar to 2.9 million by 2031 from its 2006 base of 884,000 adherents. Hmmmm.......Islamism....A minority bullying the majority?Read the full story here.

• Stop in the name of Love?Turkish Cypriot imam under investigation after spraypainting own mosque.(HurriyetDaily).An imam in Turkish Cyprus is under investigation for allegedly spraying his own mosque with graffiti after falling in love with a Russian woman who did not return his feelings, daily Hürriyet reported on its website Thursday.Veli Özsorun, an imam at Güzelyurt district's Aydınköy village in Turkish Cyprus, reportedly met a Russian woman known as Snejana three years ago and fell in love with her. His love, however, was unrequited.Reportedly seeking to proclaim his love for all to see, Özsorun sprayed graffiti all over the mosque that said he wanted Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the island's renowned Naqshbandi sheikh, Nazım Kıbrısi, to be witnesses at his wedding.The Directorate of Religious Affairs has begun an investigation into the matter.Village residents said Özsorun had been an imam at the village for seven years but started acting strangely after meeting the Russian woman.Hmmmm....."The lord works in mysterious ways"?Read the full story here.

• Disfigured Saleh appears defiant but keeps dialogue door open.(Al-Arabia). By James M. Dorsey.Embattled Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh appeared emaciated and scarred, but in his first public sighting since the June bombing of his presidential compound in Sana’a that forced him to seek medical treatment in Saudi Arabia, clearly had not lost any of his feistiness or defiance. Speaking in a pre-recorded, seven-minute television address, Mr. Saleh accused his opponents of having an “incorrect understanding of democracy,” but insisted that he wished to share power and engage in dialogue with protesters who have been demanding his immediate departure after 33 years in office.For those protesting on the streets of Yemeni cities for the past four months, Mr. Saleh had nothing new to offer.Protesters and tribesmen, who fought pitched battles with Saleh loyalists in the streets of Sana’a will put little faith in the words of a man who several times agreed to a deal negotiated by the Saudi-led Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) that would have eased him out of office but then refused to sign it at the last minute.Mr. Saleh will also have failed to curry favor with his opponents by not giving any indication on whether he intended to return to Yemen once he had recovered from severe burn wounds as a result of the attack on his compound. However, Mr. Saleh’s appearance, sitting rigidly and hardly recognizable in a chair, his hair covered with a Saudi-style red and white checkered hair dress, his face scarred and his hands bandaged coupled with his disclosure that he had undergone eight operations since his departure for Saudi Arabia on June 5, suggested that his possible return would not be imminent.For Yemenis waiting to see Mr. Saleh for the first time since the attack, this could prove to be a reason to engage in a dialogue that could bring Yemen back from the brink.In the only opening in his brief remarks, Mr. Saleh endorsed Vice President Abdrabbu Mansour Hadi to engage in dialogue with his opponents. That may not seem like much of a concession, but Mr. Hadi enjoys a degree of credibility that Mr. Saleh no longer can command. Mr. Hadi has emerged as an acceptable interlocutor for Mr. Saleh’s opponents who see him as more conciliatory. Most, if not all, past meetings between opposition forces and the Saleh government have been held in his office. Mr. Hadi has also come under increasing domestic and international pressure since Mr. Saleh’s departure to Saudi Arabia to fully assume the powers of the presidency.Mr. Saleh stopped short of granting Mr.Hadi that power but seemed to want to lend greater credibility to his call for dialogue. His endorsement of Mr. Hadi allows the vice president to back off his refusal so far to act without Mr. Saleh, who constitutionally remains Yemen’s leader.All in all, Mr. Saleh’s address is certain to be viewed by his opponents as more of what they see as his duplicitous rhetoric. Nonetheless, the visual impact of the severity of his injuries coupled with his endorsement of a dialogue offers an albeit slim chance of breaking the deadlock.To end the crisis however, Saudi Arabia and the United States will have to increase pressure on Mr. Saleh to agree to step down and accept that only a popularly elected leader rather than a figure identified with the existing power structure will be able to introduce the political and economic reforms that will satisfy the protesters and put Yemen on the road to recovery.Read and see the full story here.

• Top Egyptian politician Ahmed Ezz El-Arab, Wafd Party leader calls Holocaust, 9/11 fabrications, adding Anne Frank's memoirs 'fake.'(Imra). The vice chairman of Egypt’s top secular party told the Washington Times in an interview last week that the September 11 terror attacks, the Holocaust and Anne Frank’s diary are all historical fabrications.“The Holocaust is a lie,” Ahmed Ezz El-Arab, Wafd Party leader told the Washington Times in Budapest where he was attending the Conference on Democracy and Human Rights.He went on to explain that it was factually impossible to claim that the Nazis killed 6 million Jews, saying “the Jews under German occupation were 2.4 million. So if they were all exterminated, where does the remaining 3.6 million come from?”The Egyptian politician acknowledged that the Nazis may have killed “hundreds of thousands” of Jews, but discounted the plausibility of gas chambers and skinning Jews alive, calling them “fanciful stories”.El-Arab’s Holocaust denial did not stop there, and the Egyptian politician went on to attack the authenticity of Anne Frank’s diary, the memoirs of a teenage girl who hid from the Nazis in Amsterdam, only to be discovered and die in a concentration camp.The Wafd leader recalled studying the novel that is one of the most widely distributed publications to date as a doctoral student in Stockholm. “I could swear to God it’s a fake,” he said. “The girl was there, but the memoirs are a fake.”El-Arab concurred with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s denial of the Holocaust – but discredited his motives.“He’s a hateful character, so whatever he says can be criticized,” he told the Washington Times, adding “what he says about the Holocaust is true, but he doesn’t say it because it’s true. He says it out of hatred to the Israeli state.”When asked about future peace with Israel, El-Arab attempted to assuage fears that a new Egyptian government would cancel the 1979 treaty.The Egyptian politician told the Washington Times that there is “no chance at all” that would happen,” adding “Egypt will not go to war unless it’s attacked,” he said.El-Arab’s historical revision was not reserved for the Holocaust alone, and he also shared his theories on the September 11 attacks and their perpetrators with the Washington Times.The Wafd leader denied that Osama bin Laden, the al-Qaida leader who was recently killed in an American raid on his compound in Pakistan, was behind the attacks.“He could not have the know-how or the ability to do it,” El-Arab said, calling the dead al-Qaida leader “an American agent.”The Egyptian politician added “if he had the ability, one plane only landing on the Knesset would give more effect.”El-Arab blamed the CIA, Israel’s Mossad and the “military-industrial complex”.Despite his Holocaust-denying views, it seems as though El-Arab’s overall opinion on the Jewish people is favorable, telling the Washington Time that he believes that there was once a Jewish temple in Jerusalem, entitling the Jews to a historical claim on Israel’s capital.“The Jews are there,” he said. “Good or bad, they are there.” However, he made sure to follow up with the clarification: “You cannot as a human being think of exterminating 6 million or 5 million or whatever. That’s crazy.”Hmmmmm.......Obama's ...'Speaking Partners'.Read the full story here.

• Shame on Cuba: Blind Eye to Human Trafficking.(Heritage).“If the girls give me trouble I hurt them.” These are the words of human trafficker Aktham Zuhair Salem Madanat. Known for trafficking girls from Cuba to the United Kingom, Madanat had no qualms about openly discussing how he lured 10- and 11-year-old girls into the sex trade. In fact, Madanat is one of many involved in the lucrative human trafficking market throughout Cuba and beyond.In order to fight human trafficking, the State Department annually presents its Global Trafficking in Persons Report, a survey of 184 countries that measures compliance with human trafficking regulations specified in the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA).The 2011 Report places Cuba and Venezuela on the Tier 3 list.The Tier 3 designation is reserved for countries that do not comply with the minimum requirements in TVPA. Noncompliant countries receiving U.S. assistance can be sanctioned.Cuba’s placement on Tier 3 is both warranted and necessary. Because prostitution is not criminalized for anyone over the age of 16, it is difficult to track child prostitution in Cuba. Economic malfeasance in Cuba has forced many young women into the sex-for-sale industry. Cuba’s tourism industry generated around $2 billion just in the past year, and illicit sex is a burgeoning part of the tourism industry profile. In fact, it has been suggested that the Cuban government even encourages sex tourism as a source for foreign cash that keeps the communist regime afloat.Fidel and Raul Castro have turned a blind eye to sex tourism and human trafficking. One of Fidel Castro’s flippant brush-offs included the following: There are no women forced to sell themselves to a man, to a foreigner, to a tourist…Those who do so do it on their own, voluntarily and without any need for it. We can say that they are highly educated hookers and quite healthy…Hmmmmm........"The best of the best"?Read the full story here.