MFS - The Other News

                        Morning Posting.

• Updated !Earthquakes in the last 24 hours in the world seismic activity in Philipines 5.2  and 5.3 in Papua! More info here.

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

• Appeals court rules against Obama healthcare law.(Yahoo).WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An appeals court ruled Friday that President Barack Obama's healthcare law requiring Americans to buy healthcare insurance or face a penalty was unconstitutional, a blow to the White House.The Appeals Court for the 11th Circuit, based in Atlanta, found that Congress exceeded its authority by requiring Americans to buy coverage, but also ruled that the rest of the wide-ranging law could remain in effect.The legality of the so-called individual mandate, a cornerstone of the 2010 healthcare law, is widely expected to be decided by the Supreme Court. The Obama administration has defended the provision as constitutional.The case stems from a challenge by 26 U.S. states which had argued the individual mandate, set to go into effect in 2014, was unconstitutional because Congress could not force Americans to buy health insurance or face the prospect of a penalty."This economic mandate represents a wholly novel and potentially unbounded assertion of congressional authority: the ability to compel Americans to purchase an expensive health insurance product they have elected not to buy, and to make them re-purchase that insurance product every month for their entire lives," a divided three-judge panel said.Obama and his administration had pressed for the law to help halt the steep increases in healthcare costs and expand insurance coverage to the more than 30 million Americans who are without it.It argued that the requirement was legal under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution. One of the three judges of the appeals court panel, Stanley Marcus, agreed with the administration in dissenting from the majority opinion.Read the full story here.

• "Syria :'“We will not bow except for God.'More protests planned in Syria as Assad forces kill 24 in intensified assaults.(Al-Arabiya).Syrian protesters were preparing for massive demonstrations on Friday under the title “We will not bow except for God,” as Syrian forces killed at least 24 people in raids near the Lebanon border and in the country’s Sunni tribal heartland, activists said, pursuing a military campaign to crush street protests against President Bashar Al Assad. President Assad’s forces have intensified assaults on towns and cities across the country since the start of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan to subdue mounting dissent against the ruling family, despite threats of new US sanctions and calls from Turkey, Syria’s powerful northern neighbor, and Arab nations, to halt the attacks.“Assad remains convinced that the military solution is working, ignoring the fact that as soon as he contains demonstrations in one town they erupt in another,” a Western diplomat in the Syrian capital said, according to Reuters.“At one point he may not have enough loyalist troops capable of exerting control over simultaneous centers of protests,” he added. Mr. Assad belongs to Shiite Islam’s minority Alawite sect. “A man was killed early Friday while trying to flee when security forces began arresting residents in the Damascus suburb of Saqba,” Rami Abdul Rahman, head of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told AFP.The woman was also killed in a security force operation at dawn in the town of Kahn Sheikhun in northwestern Idlib province, he added.Activists and rights campaigners said 13 civilians, including a woman and a child, were killed on Thursday when troops and tanks swept into Qusair, 135 km (85 miles) north of Damascus, after overnight protests calling for President Assad’s removal.In nearby Homs, activists said on Friday that five people, including a nine-year-old boy, were killed in an overnight raid on the Byada residential district after protests in the city.Nightly Ramadan prayers, or ‘tarawih,’ which follow the breaking of the fast, have given more Syrians a focus for daily protest marches against 41 years of President Assad family rule over the country of 20 million, activists said.Syrian authorities have expelled most independent journalists since the five-month-old uprising began, making it difficult to verify reports from both sides.In the east, troops and Military Intelligence personnel, backed by armored vehicles, stepped up their assault on Deir Al Zor, capital of an oil-producing province bordering Iraq's Sunni heartland.Four civilians were killed in house-to-house raids in Deir Al Zor on Thursday and several shops belonging to families of prominent dissidents in the city were burned down, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.One person was killed in the coastal city of Latakia.About 14 tanks and armored vehicles swept into Saraqeb, a town on Syria’s main north-south highway that has seen daily demonstrations, and security forces arrested 100 people, residents said by telephone.US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said sanctions against Syria’s oil and gas industry were needed to put pressure on President Assad. She called on Europe and China, main foreign players in Syria’s energy sector along with Russia, to do more in imposing sanctions on Syria, Reuters reported.Syria’s oil industry, with which the ruling family has close links, generates most of the state’s hard currency from crude output of 380,000 barrels per day.On Wednesday Washington imposed sanctions on Syria’s largest bank and on biggest mobile telephone company, controlled by Assad’s cousin Rami Makhlouf, and on Thursday US ambassador to Damascus Robert Ford said more sanctions would follow if the Syrian authorities did not stop their use of violence.Regional powers Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Egypt have all put pressure on Mr. Assad to stop the violence. US President Barack Obama and Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan spoke on Thursday and agreed Syrians’ demands for a transition to democracy must be met, the White House said.Hmmmm.....Is Erdogan under pressure from Iran covering Assad's behaviour?Read the full story here.

• USAID halts aid to Gaza: US official.(Ihrtimes).RAMALLAH: USAID is halting humanitarian assistance to the Gaza Strip over alleged meddling by the radical Palestinian group Hamas, a US official said on Friday.“We deeply regret that USAID-funded partner organisations operating in Gaza are forced by Hamas’s actions to suspend their assistance work,” the official said on condition of anonymity.“USAID assistance programs were put on hold effective August 12,” he added.Read full story here.

• Some unions to skip 2012 convention.(AP). WASHINGTON  -- More than a dozen trade unions plan to sit out the 2012 Democratic convention because of their anger over the site of the meeting in a right-to-work state and their frustration over Democrats' struggles to create jobs.If unions don't participate, it would deprive the party of millions of dollars that would have been spent on sky boxes and other sponsorships that usually help underwrite the convention. The move could pose a larger problem for President Barack Obama next year if an increasingly dispirited base of labor activists becomes so discouraged that it doesn't get the rank-and-file to the polls in its usual strong numbers.The unions - all part of the AFL-CIO's building and construction trades unit - told party officials this week they are gravely disappointed that labor was not consulted before Democrats settled on Charlotte, N.C., where there are no unionized hotels."We find it troubling that the party so closely associated with basic human rights would choose a state with the lowest unionization rate in the country due to regressive policies aimed at diluting the power of workers," Mark Ayers, president of the building trades unit, wrote in a letter to Democratic Chairman Debbie Wasserman Schultz.But the angst could spread. The International Association of Machinists, which is not part of the building trades, said it has also decided to skip the convention after participating for decades."This is the union that came up with the idea for Labor Day and this convention starts on Labor Day in a right to work state," said IAM spokesman Rick Sloan. "We see that as an affront to working men and women across this country."Monroe said the unions are being careful not to use the term "boycott" because they don't want damage Obama's re-election prospects. He said money is also a major factor, when unions are spending millions trying to beat back efforts by Republican lawmakes to beat back union rights in Wisconsin, Ohio and other states."It would be disappointing to our members to see us doing business as usual, diverting resources that we know are scarce when we should be laser-like focused on getting elected officials focused on the jobs agenda," Monroe said.AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka warned earlier this year that unions would focus more of their energy and money shoring up infrastructure in the states and less on boosting a single political party.The choice of North Carolina earlier this year provoked immediate outrage among labor leaders, who said it was another indication that Democrats take union support for granted. But Democrats defended the decision, saying it's part of party's push to win crucial swing states in the South, including a state that Obama carried in 2008.Organized labor and Democrats had a similar squabble over the choice of Denver for the 2008 convention, where the gathering was held at the non-union Pepsi Center and the city had few unionized hotels. At one point, Teamsters President James Hoffa threatened to "blow up" the convention with picketing and protests if union issues were not worked out.But the two sides ultimately struck a deal to staff the Pepsi Center with union employees.Hmmmm......Obama has only one priority and it aint Union members their jobs.Read the full story here.

• The CIA Should Be More CAIR-less.(DianaWest).By Diana West.This week, a three-day conference hosted by the CIA on "homegrown radicalization" was supposed to have taken place at CIA headquarters. It did not. The conference was abruptly canceled -- or, softening the blow, "postponed." Question: Did pressure from what we might (and should) call a certain "homegrown radical" group -- the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) -- make this happen?Here is what we know.

On Monday, July 18, CAIR issued a press release headlined: "CAIR Asks CIA to Drop Islamophobic Trainer." It revealed that CAIR national executive director Nihad Awad wrote a letter to now-former CIA director Leon Panetta to that effect. The rest of the release is more opaque. In referencing an NPR report that slammed one counterterrorism trainer by name, former FBI agent John Guandolo, for "allegedly smearing" an "Ohio Muslim" in a presentation, CAIR noted that an entirely different trainer, unnamed, was "scheduled to hold a similar session in August for the CIA." (Full disclosure: Guandolo and I are among 19 co-authors of "Shariah: the Threat to America.") The August CIA "session" appears to be the driver of both the CAIR release and letter asking the CIA, as the headline put it, to "Drop Islamophobic Trainer."

On Friday, July 22, an email from the CIA informed hundreds of confirmed attendees that the whole August "radicalization" conference was off (much to the consternation of those who had already purchased non-refundable airline tickets). "The sponsors -- in partnership with the Department of Homeland Security -- have decided to delay the conference so it can include insights from, among other sources, the new National Strategy for Counterterrorism, in an updated agenda," the email said. The goal "is to ensure that conference participants receive material that is as current and comprehensive as possible...."The fact is, no matter how many times Bill O'Reilly plays "no-spin-zone" host to CAIR spokesmen, CAIR co-founder and national director Nihad Awad, the man who asked the CIA to drop the "Islamophobic" trainer, has been identified by the FBI as a member of the terrorist group Hamas, which is an offshoot wing** of the Muslim Brotherhood. The same goes for CAIR co-founder Omar Ahmad. Both men have long been involved in what is a veritable constellation of Islamic front groups affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood, whose 1991 "explanatory memorandum" calls on Brothers to "understand that their work in America is a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and 'sabotaging' their miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God's religion is made victorious over all religions."The FBI has been following what clearly became a Muslim-Brotherhood-Hamas-CAIR (and more) nexus since 1993. (CAIR was founded in 1994 and Hamas was designated a terrorist organization by the United States in 1995.) After this linkage became public record during the landmark Holy Land Foundation jihad financing trial (in which CAIR was labeled an unindicted co-conspirator), the FBI finally ended all formal contacts with CAIR in 2008.This policy holds. In March 2011, under questioning by Rep. Louis Gohmert (Texas Republican) before the House Judiciary Oversight Committee, FBI director Robert Mueller confirmed, albeit grudgingly, that "we" -- the FBI -- "have no formal relationship with CAIR because of concerns with regard to the national leadership."So what's wrong with the CIA? Congress should -- must -- find out by investigating how it is that a Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas creation such as CAIR, which the FBI broke relations with, appears to exert so much influence on the CIA's information battle space. I think Lewis Carroll already told this story, but when he was writing, the rabbit hole wasn't such a dangerous place. The Hamas Charter identifies Hamas, aka the Islamic Resistance Movement, as “one of the wings of Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine.”Hmmmm....."I Will Stand with My Muslim Brothers".Read the full story here.

• New START’s Deadly Implications.(TheFoundry).By Michaela Bendikova.The Obama Administration’s “reset” policy with the Russian Federation is failing in yet another important aspect of this relationship: its predictability regarding the development of each country’s respective nuclear forces. This is despite the Obama Administration touting the New Strategic Arms Control Treaty (New START) as one of the greatest accomplishments of the reset policy.The list of U.S. “reset” concessions is extensive: unilateral cuts of U.S. strategic nuclear forces, abandonment of missile defense deployments in Poland and the Czech Republic, neglect of Russian aggressiveness in the areas of the former Soviet Union, and reduced criticism of political freedom violations in Russia. Yet, since President Obama took office, Moscow has launched the most ambitious nuclear weapons modernization program since the end of the Cold War, including the development of new types of highly destabilizing “heavy” intercontinental-range ballistic missiles (ICBMs) in return.Heavy ICBMs are ballistic missiles equipped with multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRVs). MIRVs have been considered destabilizing because they offer a significant strategic advantage to whoever uses them first. Russia is reportedly working on at least three new heavy ICBMs. These new systems are likely to have the capability to destroy U.S. ICBMs (and grounded bombers) if the Russians strike first.The U.S. does not have any substantial nuclear modernization plans, unlike Russia and all other nuclear-armed countries in the world. President Obama’s promises to modernize the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal look increasingly dim given the fiscal environment. It is the policy of the Obama Administration not to develop new nuclear warheads, support new military missions for nuclear weapons, or provide for new military capabilities. This leaves Washington stuck with nuclear warheads last tested in 1992 mounted on decades-old delivery systems. It is also U.S. policy not to MIRV its ICBMs.New START was supposed to bring predictability into the U.S.–Russia strategic relationship. In February 2011, following the New START’s entry into force, Ellen Tauscher, Under Secretary for Arms Control and International Security, argued that “we can reduce the role and number of nuclear weapons and enhance our security.” As President Reagan would have said, this is just not so.As it turns out, the United States will have to unilaterally reduce its nuclear weapons arsenal under the terms of New START. These reductions might cost U.S. taxpayers more than $1 billion over the next seven years. Meanwhile, Russia can actually build up its nuclear forces, which is exactly what it has been doing.In addition, New START’s verification provisions are inadequate, as Heritage’s experts reported in July 2010. The treaty has a minimal contribution to the U.S. ability to monitor Russian modernization as the data exchanges are severely restricted and the number of inspections is limited to the point of being largely irrelevant.The “reset” policy fails exactly where it was supposed to succeed: in the nuclear disarmament and arms control area.Hmmmmm.......If he really wanted to destroy America would he have done anything different?Read the full story here.

• Iran continues to bomb Kurdish areas in South Kurdistan with intelligence gathered from American UAV's! (Hevallo).PKK Message to Turkey, Iran, US and EU: If you want Turkey to be an energy hub then you must solve Kurdish Question peacefully!11th August 23.30 a massive explosion occurred on one of the main gas pipelines transporting gas into Turkey from Iran!As the Turkish and Iranian Armies ignore Kurdish pleas for political resolutions to the conflict, Iran continues to bomb Kurdish areas in South Kurdistan with intelligence gathered from American UAV's! It is an extraordinary situation that brings Turkey, Iran, KRG and USA together in an unholy alliance against the Kurdish Freedom Fighters of PJAK and PKK.With 4 sabotage attacks within one month on main oil and gas arteries the PKK have sent a very strong and unequivocal message to this alliance."If you insist on pursuing a military solution to the Kurdish issue then you will pay a heavy price!"Knowing the PKK and their military and political experience I suspect that these attacks are just the initial warning!Read the full story here.

• KUHNER: Don’t go on vacation - just GO.(WashingtonTimes).Now that his incompetence is obvious, Obama should resign.America’s economy is in free-fall. Growth is anemic. The stock market is collapsing. Real unemployment - combining the high jobless rate with rampant underemployment - is higher than 16 percent. Manufacturing is dead. Deficits, debt and government spending are at record levels. Our credit rating has been downgraded for the first time in history. The trade deficit has exploded to the highest in years.A possible Great Depression haunts the land. Primarily one man is to blame: President Obama.

Mr. Obama has racked up more than $4 trillion in debt. His massive spending stimulus has failed and made the jobless situation worse. Before his stimulus package was passed in February 2009, the unemployment rate stood at 7.8 percent. Today it is at 9.1 percent - and rising. Mr. Obama promised that his Keynesian borrow-and-spend policies would kick-start the economy. He has run up three consecutive trillion-dollar-plus budget deficits, an orgy of spending unrivaled in our history. The result: Nearly 2 million private-sector jobs have been wiped out, the U.S. dollar has eroded, investor and business confidence has been shattered, and America is no longer the world’s economic superpower. Washington has become a financial colony of China.

Mr. Obama, however, is a campus radical in the White House. He is inflicting severe, almost irreparable damage. His administration is so inept it can barely perform basic functions. Lifting the debt ceiling - something that was routine for presidents from Ronald Reagan to George W. Bush - was turned into a national nightmare, as Mr. Obama played a game of brinkmanship. In the end, the borrowing limit was raised, the reckless spending spree continues, and more unsustainable debt has been saddled upon future generations. The president’s demagoguery - his false warnings of a default, his threats to withhold Social Security checks, his inflammatory attacks on Tea Party Republicans - only served to unnerve global economic markets, fostering an atmosphere of immediate panic and crisis.The president celebrated his 50th birthday by throwing a big bash at the White House. Trendy celebrities - Tom Hanks, Chris Rock, Stevie Wonder, Jay Z - showed up to eat, drink and be merry. Mr. Obama even danced barefooted while gorging on barbecued ribs and champagne. With the economy crumbling, financial markets melting and millions jobless, hurting and hungry, the president cared mostly about having a good time. He lectures the country by day while partying at night.Mr. Obama is the most arrogant, self-absorbed and self-obsessed president in U.S. history. Nothing is ever his fault. He blames everyone and everything for America’s economic woes - Tea Partyers, Wall Street, Japanese earthquakes, insurance executives, oil companies, millionaires and corporate jet owners. He lashes out at imaginary enemies without ever taking personal responsibility. In his mind, he is - and always will be - the Anointed One.There is only one solution: Drive him from office. Americans should forge a mass grassroots movement demanding that Mr. Obama step down - immediately. Through bumper stickers, picket signs, posters, T-shirts and rallies, tens of millions of citizens should express the same message: Leave. It is highly unlikely he will step aside, but such a movement would cripple the president’s authority and possibly blunt him from doing further harm. It also would puncture his boundless ego. A widespread manifestation of no confidence would break him - politically, morally and psychologically - in order to save America. Mr. Obama is out of his depth. He lacks the character, intelligence, skills and experience - the basic competence - to be the leader of the free world.Resign, Mr. President.Hmmmm.......Hear,hear!And please keep going!Read the full story here.

• Iranian gas flow to Turkey halted by explosion, Kurdish rebels suspected.(Al-Arabiya).Iranian gas flow to Turkey has been halted due to an explosion on the pipeline in Turkey overnight and repairs have been started which will take one week, the Turkish energy ministry said Friday. “Work continues to put out the fire,” the governor’s office in Agri province said in a statement quoted by Anatolia news agency.“It has been established that the incident was caused by a terrorist attack,” around 11:10 pm (2010 GMT) Thursday, it added.Anatolia said an explosion rocked the region two kilometers (1.2 miles) from Agri, causing the fire.Firefighters were sent to the site and the pipeline was shut off. An energy ministry official speaking on condition of anonymity said that repairs on the pipeline had started and would last about a week. He said Turkey was buying additional gas from Azerbaijan and Russia to cover the shortfall caused by the explosion.Turkey receives between 15 and 18 billion cubic meters of gas a day via the Iranian pipeline which links the western city of Tabriz with the Turkish capital.The governor’s office did not identify any perpetrators but Kurdish rebels fighting for a homeland were widely seen as the main suspects.Rebels of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) are regarded as terrorists by Turkey, the European Union and the United States.The nationalists want constitutional recognition for the Kurds, regional self-governance and Kurdish-language education in schools.The Turkish army holds the PKK responsible for the 45,000 deaths the conflict has caused on both sides.Iran is Turkey’s second-biggest supplier of natural gas after Russia, sending 10 billion cubic meters of gas each year. Turkey uses gas to fire half of its power plants.Late last month, gas exports from Iran to Turkey were briefly halted due to a blast. The pipeline was swiftly repaired and gas flows were resumed a day later.The PKK has claimed two separate attacks on the pipeline on August 3.Hmmmm........Read the full story here.

• Obama: ‘Last thing we need’ is for Congress to return to DC.(Thehill)President Obama blasted Congress from the road on Thursday, saying things would be worse if lawmakers returned to Washington.“There is nothing wrong with our country,” Obama said in a speech at a Holland, Mich. plant. “There is something wrong with our politics.”Obama rolled out what sounded like a new campaign theme Thursday that makes Washington gridlock his foil and the obstacle to increased economic recovery.“The last thing we need is Congress spending more time arguing in D.C.,” Obama, grasping for an aggressive message amid economic turmoil, said to applause from the crowd.“What I figure is they need to spend more time out here listening to you and hearing how fed up you are. That's why I'm here.”Hmmmmm.......It seems 'dear leader' has decided there's no longer a congress needed but perhaps an Imperator Rex?Read the full story here.

• Obama’s Iftar guest list omits controversial attendees.(DailyCaller).The White House’s published guest list for this year’s Ramadan Iftar dinner was much shorter than previous years’ roster. It excluded the names of several controversial advocates who have attended the event in the past, including some who The Daily Caller can confirm did attend on Wednesday night.“It was a squeaky clean list,” said Durriya Badani, director of the U.S.-Islamic World Forum, an annual event organized by the Brookings Institution’s Saban Center and the Qatari government. The guests on the published list are “not controversial at all,” said Badani, whose name is on the list the White House provided to reporters.“It was a lot more low-key … It was a more intimate event this year,” said Haris Tarin, the Washington director of the Muslim Public Affairs Council, whose invitation was kept off the published list. “I have no idea why they didn’t publish [MPAC’s invite] … I’m going to learn about that a little bit more,” he told The Daily Caller.Mohamed Magid also attended but did not appear on the White House’s publish list. Magid is imam of the All Dulles Area Muslim Society mosque in Northern Virginia and the current president of the Islamic Society of North America. Along with MPAC, Magid’s two organizations have drawn criticism from a loose network of online critics who claim they are sympathetic to Islamist groups.Whether intentional or not, the shorter list limited the risk of a political embarrassment for the White House because it downplayed the attendance of several ideological Islamist groups, including MPAC, said Zuhdi Jasser, president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, a pro-Western Muslim group. But the White House also failed to invite any of the 25 pro-liberty American Muslim groups and individuals in Jasser’s American Islamic Leadership Coalition, he said.Iftar is the evening meal when Muslims break their fast during the month of Ramadan.The public guest list did include ambassadors from Muslim-majority democratic countries, such as Iraq and Bangladesh, as well as the ambassador of Israel, roughly 20 percent of whose population is Muslim. Also included were numerous ambassadors from Islamic countries that do not accept democracy or welcome non-Islamic religions. These included Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and both Yemen and Bahrain, whose governments have violently suppressed public demonstrations this year.Obama, Jasser complained, “has not been clear on what America stands for, on the freedom agenda in the Middle East, [so] he ends up at an Iftar dinner that panders to ambassadors” who oppose American’s vision of freedom, Jasser said.The list also excluded a few controversial attendees, such as Tarin from MPAC and Mohamed Magid, who is the imam of the All Dulles Area Muslim Society mosque in Northern Virginia and the current president of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA).Critics of Tarin’s and Magid’s organizations — including the Investigative Project on Terrorism — use the Internet to publish court records, translate Arab-language media reports, and record information released by Muslim advocacy groups in the United States and overseas. For example, court records now available online show that the federal government designated ISNA an unindicted co-conspirator during the 2008 trial of Texas Muslims who smuggled money to the Hamas terror group.Hmmmm......Read the full story here.

• “We need to create a new generation of journalists” to address national issues within the framework of Islam.(MuslimMedianetwork).Rep. Rashida Tlaib spoke at the event of her admiration that all of the winners were women, and emphasized that many non-Muslim journalists write nonsense about Islam, which is then picked up by other non-Muslim journalists who repeat it, and she emphasized the importance for non-Muslim journalists to reach out and talk to the other side.Dr. Nakadar said that the first commandment of Allah, transmitted through the Angel Jibril (as) to Prophet (s) was “Iqra,” or read. This is important for two reasons. First, this initial commandment of “iqra” began a 23 year period of revelation and in fact communication, the communication from Allah (swt) through the angel Gabriel (as) to Prophet Muhammad (s); second, the first word of the 23 year period of communication was a commandment to read—thus he argues that communication and iqra (education) are the two most important fundamental aspects of the beginning of Islam. Those who have understood the value of communication and education are flourishing today, while Muslims who have ignored these intial commandments have suffered.Without a voice, Dr. Nakadar argued, there is no power in politics because political outcomes are predetermined by the tone of the news that reaches people before they vote, or before they act in politics.“We need to create a new generation of journalists” to address national issues within the framework of Islam.Dr. Jawad Shah gave another keynote speech, arguing that journalists must give deep thought to their articles before printing them, and that Muslim journalists if true to the ideal he advocated would be able to bring a level of profoundness to their reporting far beyond the superficial coverage he complained of from non-Muslim journalists.Hmmmm......It is called :"Freedom of speech".What happened to "We don't want to take over your country"?Read the full story here.

• Toward Victory in the War of Ideas: Educating America About Shariah.(BigPeace).The mainstream media has begun to notice the millions of Americans concerned with the anti-Constitutional character of Shariah, or Islamic law. Predictably, they’re intent on smearing these people, and cooking up sinister Koch Brothers-like figures they intimate are pulling the strings. It began with a New York Times article on my colleagues David Yerushalmi and Frank Gaffney and, predictably, volleyed over to the ideologically simpatico NPR, where Times reporter Andrea Elliott spent sixteen minutes trying to explain the strange phenomenon to Fresh Air’s audience.At the American Thinker today, David Yerushalmi responds to the New York Times‘ font-page story, “The Man Behind the Anti-Shariah Movement,” in his inimitable style. In addition to the larger issues, he addresses the use of out-of-context quotes by ideological bloggers in an effort to smear him.Yerushalmi’s article is a must-read, especially for the background he provides into this interesting story of how to fight the war of ideas successfully, changing the terms of the debate through a nation-wide educational campaign (and certain to be seized up by ThinkProgress and others as proof of some nefarious ‘conspiracy’):

As Ms. Elliot points out in her story and in her interview with NPR, Frank Gaffney’s Center for Security Policy was, along with others in this effort, able to take a failed national security policy and policy discourse, which treated Islamic-inspired jihad as some kind of ultimate perversion of Islam lacking dogmatic and normative grounding, into a serious discussion of classical and still extant authoritative Islamic law — sharia — as the threat doctrine motivating jihadists from all over the globe. Determining what doctrine drives your enemy, especially one that can explain both the recruitment capabilities of your enemy and how he is able to bridge cultural, language, and nationality differences, and even intra-religious sect animosities, to come together to fight the West as the common enemy is the second step to defeating the enemy. The first step, of course, is being able to articulate who the enemy is beyond the intentionally vague nomenclature of “terrorist” or “extremist.”

Yerushalmi has a brilliant question to pose to the ACLU, the mainstream media reporters, the leftist bloggers, and anyone skeptical about the problem of Shariah in the US:

if Muslims in Muslim countries overwhelmingly support the imposition of sharia as law to govern an Islamic political order, and if Muslims in Muslim countries overwhelmingly support the imposition of sharia criminal law, such as capital punishment for apostasy and blasphemy, and even assuming Ms. Elliot is correct that Muslim Americans have somehow created a very different Islam from what their brethren in the Muslim world believe, how does she know or even assume that this distinction between American Islam and genuine Muslim Islam will continue?Hmmmm.........Silence.....Crickets?Read the full story here.

• 'Todays zaman's take on obama' : Think big, Mr. Obama.(TodaysZaman).Herewith, a few tips for our beleaguered president: Good that you’re taking your bus trip through the Midwest, but you should probably can your usual August escape to Martha’s Vineyard if the economy continues to crumble.I know you need a break, but you’re headed toward a long break starting Jan. 20, 2013, unless you change course.We’ll need other, less fleeting forms of stimulus, too. You should call for renewing aid to state and local governments. Infrastructure bank or no, you need a long-term program to make our nation navigable again. (Our knowledge of how to get from A to B has improved, thanks to global-positioning technology, even as the road, airway and rail connections between A and B have declined.)Those kinds of projects may take years to realize. Your first stimulus failed to establish a fast track for creating less-capital-intensive jobs in maintenance, rehabilitating buildings, and child and elder care. It deferred job creation to state and local governments, which have taken forever to set up even such relatively low-tech endeavors as home-weatherization projects. This time around, you should acknowledge the bottlenecks in your first stimulus and call for a federal job corps to do this kind of work.Republicans will call you a socialist and refuse to pass any of this, with the possible exception of a payroll tax suspension. But you need a program to run on, one that gives people some hope for the nation’s economic prospects and their own. The small stuff won’t do that. It’s time to go big.So forget the Vineyard. When Congress comes back (you can call it back if the economy keeps dropping), address a joint session and lay out what we need to do to get the economy on track. Don’t get rattled if the Republicans boo. You’re making your case for salvaging the American economy and your presidency. And, brother, do you need one.Read the full story here.

• You got to be kidding?Iranian Basij Commander: We're Ready To Send Peacekeepers To UK.(Memri).The commander of Iran's Basij force, Mohammad-Reza Naqdi, has said that the Basij is ready to deploy peacekeeper forces in London."The Ashura brigades of Basij forces are ready to be deployed to London as peacekeeping forces," Brigadier General Mohammad-Reza Naqdi said yesterday. Naqdi criticized the British authorities for their harsh crackdown on protesters and for describing them as rioters and hooligans. "Unfortunately the crimes and violence of the autocratic British kingdom continues against the country's deprived [population], and not only has the advice of well-wishers had no effect on the conduct of the regime's repressive police force, but we are witnessing the deprived people of this country being called a bunch of thieves and looters," he said.He continued, "If the UN General Assembly approves, the Basij Organization is ready to send a number of Ashura and Al-Zahra brigades to Liverpool and Birmingham as peacekeepers to monitor observation of human rights laws and deter the use of force." Referring to Prince William's lavish wedding and the high cost of its live coverage, he described the recent uprisings in Britain as the result of "big mistakes" by British officials and warned them of even more severe consequences. "This is the beginning of the road, and the UK regime has to pay the price for the massacres in Africa, wars and bloodshed in the Indian peninsula, crimes in China, the fall of the Ottoman Empire and bloody conflicts among Muslims and followers of other faiths," he said. He said that the uprising in Britain, even if suppressed at this stage, goes far deeper than political unrest or factional conflict that could be easily resolved. "This wound will come to a head elsewhere…The people of Britain have awakened and will definitely take their rights back," he stated. He also mentioned remarks by Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who had earlier warned of revolutions in Europe similar to those in North Africa and the Middle East.Hmmmm......."We are all children of a loving God"?Read the full story here.

• Teenage Olympics 2012 ambassador Chelsea Ives led into court in handcuffs yesterday accused of vandalising a police car during riots.(Mirror).In a major blow to the Games image, the talented athlete, 18, was also said to have smashed up a Phones4U shop in riots.Her mum called 999 after apparently spotting her on TV. Adrienne, 47, said: “I had to do what was right".Ives was taken into court early yesterday as magistrates in London, Manchester and Birmingham sat in unprecedented all-night hearings to deal with rioters.The teenager was one of the young role models picked to encourage youngsters to take up sport in the run-up to 2012. She has met Olympics chief Sebastian Coe, Boris Johnson and footballer Martin Keown. In 2009, Ives was invited to the Commons after the success of a football project run by Leyton Orient community sport programme.But on Sunday night she was captured on camera allegedly causing more than £5,000 damage by hurling bricks at a police car in Enfield, North London.Westminster magistrates court was told Ives boasted to friends she had “the best day ever”.Becky Owen, prosecuting, claimed the youngster also led an attack on a phone store. She said: “She was first to pick up masonry and hurl it at the window.”Following the case, mum Adrienne said the decision to call police about her daughter was “gut wrenching”.But Mrs Ives added: “My husband and I were watching the news and it was absolutely sickening. And then we saw our daughter. I could not believe it. “She won’t thank us. I will be portrayed as a b**** – but what were we supposed to do?”Ives denied two charges of burglary, violent disorder and attacking a police car. She was refused bail and remanded in custody until next week when she will appear in court again.Thugs convicted of the rioting will be banned from working as security at the Olympics.Hmmmm.....Finalist Olympic brick thrower?Read the full story here.

• Iran seeking alliance to protect Syria against U.S. meddling.(TehranTimes).TEHRAN – Top Iranian lawmaker Alaeddin Boroujerdi held a meeting with Nabil el-Arabi, secretary general of the Arab League and former Egyptian foreign minister, in which he called for the establishment of an axis to protect Syria against U.S. intervention. Boroujerdi, chairman of the Majlis National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, travelled to Cairo on Monday to submit Iranian Majlis Speaker Ali Larijani’s invitation to el-Arabi to participate in an international conference on Palestine, which is scheduled to be held in Tehran from October 1 to 2. His visit marked the first time a senior Iranian official has been to Egypt since former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak was ousted on February 11. During the meeting, Boroujerdi said, “Having lost Egypt, the U.S. has targeted Syria,” IRNA reported. Boroujerdi added that the United States has been stirring up unrest in Syria with the aim of defeating the resistance movement and advancing the goals of the Zionist regime. After the meeting, Boroujerdi briefed reporters on what he discussed with el-Arabi, saying they exchanged views on the latest developments in the Arab world as well as the Palestine issue.In addition, Boroujerdi attended a press conference late on Tuesday, in which he said that Tehran has given Cairo a leeway to make decisions regarding the reestablishment of bilateral relations. Iran will not set any precondition for the normalization of relations with Egypt, he said, adding, “I do not think Egypt would set any precondition in the post-revolution era.” Asked about Turkey’s stance on Syria and the news reports claiming that the Turkish authorities have intercepted an arms shipment from Iran that was destined for Syria, Boroujerdi said, “Reports about the transfer of weapons from Iran to Syria have no basis in fact, and we think that Turkey should keep calm when dealing with critical issues, and the language of threat and warning will not help resolve the problem.” “However, we are ready to have cooperation with our Muslim brothers in the neighboring country of Turkey (on Syria) just as we had had good cooperation with Turkey on issues related to Iraq,” he added. The Iranian lawmaker also said that Muslim countries should mobilize support for Syria and not allow the country to fall prey to Washington.Efforts should be made to safeguard Syria as a hub of support for the resistance of the Palestinian people against the Zionist regime, Boroujerdi said.Hmmmm.....Egypt the Muslim Brotherhood that the Obama regime pledged 2.57 Billion US Dollar to!Read the full story here.

• Iran gearing for 'cyber war'?(Ynet).Iran's Information and Communications Technology Minister Reza Taghipour accused Israel on Friday of "unmatched cyber terrorism" against nations the world over.Israel, he stated, "Ranks first in cyber terror across the globe."Quoted by Iran's Press TV, Taghipour accused Israel of "backing cyber terrorism" and using "cyber malwares… and many other forms of state terrorism." The Iranian minister said Tehran was not only fighting back, but also implementing "retaliatory measures." In a similar report by the Islamic Republic's Mehr news agency, the minister announced the establishment of Iran's Cyber Command, meant to control and block cyber attacks against Iran. The new command, he said, will lead Iran's counter measures in the field. Taghipour was likely reacting to Israel's own announcement about the establishment of a new IDF Cyber Command, as well as to uncorroborated reports claiming that the Israeli military was exploring cyber-actions against Iran.Read the full story here.

• Swiss Central Bank Weighs Pegging Franc to the Euro.(Blacklistednews).Switzerland’s central bank signaled Thursday it was prepared to consider a once-unthinkable step: pegging the nation’s “massively overvalued” currency to the euro, at least temporarily.Such a move would be a response to the global financial turmoil that has lifted the value of the Swiss franc, which investors consider a safe haven, to levels that are menacing Switzerland’s economy.“So long as they are compatible with price stability long term, temporary measures that influence the exchange rate are within our mandate,” Thomas Jordan, the vice chairman of the Swiss National Bank, said in an interview published Thursday in Tages-Anzeiger, a Swiss newspaper.“Nothing is excluded,” Jean-Pierre Danthine, a member of the central bank’s governing board, said in a separate interview in Le Temps, a Swiss daily.Linking the franc to the euro could not happen overnight, and would face steep legal and political hurdles. But whether the comments reflected a true intent or were meant mainly to sway currency traders, the remarks helped weaken the franc on Thursday, to 1.0747 euros, after it had risen as high as 1.0257 euros earlier. Against the dollar, the franc traded at 74.1 centimes.Read the full story here.

• Israeli Arab Leadership Jockeys for Central Role in Palestinian Leadership.(Memri).Since the death of Yasser Arafat in 2004, the Palestinian leadership has weakened. Another factor in that weakening is the political crisis that it has experienced in recent years – as a result, inter alia, of the stalemate in negotiations with Israel, the ongoing intra-Palestinian schism even after Hamas and Fatah signed a reconciliation agreement, and Al-Jazeera TV's accusation that the Palestinian leadership has compromised on the Palestinian issue. In light of this, the leadership of the Israeli Arabs – dubbed the "inside Palestinians" or "the '48 Palestinians" by this leadership – is now striving to become an integral part of the Palestinian people, and particularly to join the national Palestinian leadership, while challenging the Palestinian Authority (PA) over concessions it accuses it of having made in the negotiations with Israel.In August 2010, Israeli Arab MK Hanin Zou'bi (Balad) called "to rebuild the PLO so that it includes us [the Israeli Arabs] as a source of authority in everything having to do with the Arab-Israeli conflict. We are an integral part of the Palestinian people, and as such, an integral part of the general source of national authority." The Northern Branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel, which is not active in Israeli political life, has developed in a similar direction; from its traditional focus on defending Jerusalem against "Judaization," it has expanded its activity to include a broader political discourse of the overall Palestinian cause, while identifying itself with Hamas and criticizing the PA.The Israeli Arab leadership's bid to restore itself and its public to the heart of the Palestinian people and leadership, and for status equal to that of its counterparts in the West Bank, Gaza, and in exile, follows a long history of marginalization and even ostracization as collaborating with Israel. While the campaign is still in its early stages, if it does produce practical results – such as an Israeli Arab right to vote in the planned PLO National Council elections – it may alter the very essence and direction of the Israel-Palestinian conflict, shifting its focus from the outcomes of the 1967 Six-Day War and the territories occupied by Israel since then to the conflict's starting point, i.e., prior to 1948, and all its consequences. The Israeli Arab leadership has formally declared that its aim is the establishment of two states – Palestine and Israel – on the 1967 borders, while demanding that Israel be defined as a state for all its citizens. However, if the Israeli Arab leaders gain a central role in the Palestinian leadership even as they remain leaders and MKs in Israel, the geographical focal point of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict can be expected to shift to the 1948 borders.The following document is divided into two parts. The first will present Israeli Arab leaders' reactions to the condemnatory documents revealed by Al-Jazeera TV in January 2011 regarding negotiations between Israel and the PA, including reactions expressed at a rally held later that month in Baqa Al-Gharbiyye and an article on the matter by MK Hanin Zou'bi. The second part contains excerpts of interviews, articles, and lectures by Arab MKs regarding the negotiations between Israel and the PA; the effect of the recent revolutions in the Arab world on Israel-Arab relations; the Israeli Arabs' protest movement against what they call Israel's "racist" policies against them; the events of this year's Nakba ("Catastrophe") Day (May 14-15, 2011); the conflicting Israeli and Palestinian narratives; and other matters.Read the full story here.

• India: Muslim extremists disrupt prayer meeting, beat convert to Christianity.(TeaAndPolitics).Alliance of Civilizations?A gang of 50 Muslim extremists disrupted a prayer meeting at a Christian woman’s home in West Bengal, an Indian state that borders Bangladesh. Threatening to burn down the home, the group told Selina Bibi, a convert from Islam to Christianity, that she must leave the area or return to Islam.The woman, who was baptized a Protestant in March, had been stripped and beaten by local Muslims following her conversion.25% of West Bengal’s population is Muslim; nationwide, the figure is 13%.Read the full story here.

• Four Beheadings and an Apology.(HinduIDF). Indian Soldiers tortured, mutilated and beheaded in Kupwara. Media is silent.This is a post that I owe to the soldiers of India (the least I owe) who stand on our frozen northern border braving not just the enemy’s bullet but gruesome torture at the hands of demoniacal entities in the army of occupied western territories of India. The Truth On August 1st, four Indian soldiers from 20 Kumaon were beheaded by the Pakistan's Border Area Team which stormed across the line of control (I refuse to say Indian territory because it is all Indian territory). We have heard varied claims from the Indian Government as to how many soldiers died but I prefer to believe people in the defense services and their relatives.I personally did not see any reports in the media (on TV or print) regarding this incident. Infact, it was phone calls with friends and select tweets that made one aware of this incident. The general media just said that 2-3 soldiers were killed.Here are some of the early sources -:

On night of 1st aug Pak Army Battle Action Group crossed to our side and beheaded 4 of our jawans at coy post during change of guard.

“A senior Army official, requesting anonymity, disclosed that the two men of Kumaon Regiment were killed and their heads were chopped off. Their bodies were also mutilated.” Such was the mutilation that the families of the soldiers were requested not to lift the shrouds covering their bodies.Read the full story here.