MFS - The Other News

                        Afternoon 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.

• Cell Phone Censorship in San Francisco?(ACLU).Pop quiz: where did a government agency shut down cell service yesterday to disrupt a political protest? Syria? London? Nope. San Francisco.The answer may seem surprising, but that’s exactly what happened yesterday evening. The Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) asked wireless providers to halt service in four stations in San Francisco to prevent protestors from communicating with each other. The action came after BART notified riders that there might be demonstrations in the city.All over the world people are using mobile devices to organize protests against repressive regimes, and we rightly criticize governments that respond by shutting down cell service, calling their actions anti-democratic and a violation of the rights to free expression and assembly. Are we really willing to tolerate the same silencing of protest here in the United States?BART’s actions were glaringly small-minded as technology and the ability to be connected have many uses. Imagine if someone had a heart attack on the train when the phones were blocked and no one could call 911.And where do we draw the line? These protestors were using public transportation to get to the demonstration — should the government be able to shut that down too?Shutting down access to mobile phones is the wrong response to political protests, whether it’s halfway around the world or right here at home. The First Amendment protects everybody’s right to free expression, and when the government responds to people protesting against it by silencing them, it’s dangerous to democracy.Hmmmm......And so it begun?Read the full story here.

• Muslim Brotherhood Calls on Iran to End Support of Syrian Regime.(Ikwan).The Muslim Brotherhood called on Iran to end its support of the current Syrian government in the wake of violent clashes that have erupted since mid-March which left nearly 2000 dead and 3,000 missing since the conflict started.The Muslim Brotherhood called on Iran to end its support of the current Syrian government in the wake of violent clashes that have erupted since mid-March which left nearly 2000 dead and 3,000 missing since the conflict started.A statement issued by the group last Wednesday urged neighboring countries to develop a strategy to come up with solutions to resolve the internal crisis in Syria by supporting the revolution against tyranny and corruption.The Brotherhood commended the recent moves by Arab states, including Bahrain, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia who summoned their envoys from Damascus, and called on the new Egyptian government to do its part and support the Syrians against the dictatorial and tyrannical Assad regime.These measures indicate that Syria’s massacres are unacceptable and Syria will remain isolated if it continues this violence, the statement added.Ending its statement, the MB added that it has become difficult to differentiate the actions by the Syrian military and that of the Israeli Occupation Forces which openly practice, oppression, violent crackdowns and the crude shedding of blood against peaceful citizens.Hmmmmm......."And what are you prepared to do now...... Iran?" Read the full story here.

• What Happened to Obama? Absolutely Nothing.(WSJ).By Norman Podhoretz. He is still the same anti-American leftist he was before becoming our president.It's open season on President Obama. Which is to say that the usual suspects on the right (among whom I include myself) are increasingly being joined in attacking him by erstwhile worshipers on the left. Even before the S and P downgrade, there were reports of Democrats lamenting that Hillary Clinton had lost to him in 2008. Some were comparing him not, as most of them originally had, to Lincoln and Roosevelt but to the hapless Jimmy Carter. There was even talk of finding a candidate to stage a primary run against him. But since the downgrade, more and more liberal pundits have been deserting what they clearly fear is a sinking ship.Here, for example, from the Washington Post, is Richard Cohen: "He is the very personification of cognitive dissonance—the gap between what we (especially liberals) expected of the first serious African American presidential candidate and the man he in fact is." More amazingly yet Mr. Cohen goes on to say of Mr. Obama, who not long ago was almost universally hailed as the greatest orator since Pericles, that he lacks even "the rhetorical qualities of the old-time black politicians." And to compound the amazement, Mr. Cohen tells us that he cannot even "recall a soaring passage from a speech."Overseas it is the same refrain. Everywhere in the world, we read in Germany's Der Spiegel, not only are the hopes ignited by Mr. Obama being dashed, but his "weakness is a problem for the entire global economy."In short, the spell that Mr. Obama once cast—a spell so powerful that instead of ridiculing him when he boasted that he would cause "the oceans to stop rising and the planet to heal," all of liberaldom fell into a delirious swoon—has now been broken by its traumatic realization that he is neither the "god" Newsweek in all seriousness declared him to be nor even a messianic deliverer.Hence the question on every lip is—as the title of a much quoted article in the New York Times by Drew Westen of Emory University puts it— "What Happened to Obama?" Attacking from the left, Mr. Westin charges that President Obama has been conciliatory when he should have been aggressively pounding away at all the evildoers on the right.Of course, unlike Mr. Westen, we villainous conservatives do not see Mr. Obama as conciliatory or as "a president who either does not know what he believes or is willing to take whatever position he thinks will lead to his re-election." On the contrary, we see him as a president who knows all too well what he believes. Furthermore, what Mr. Westen regards as an opportunistic appeal to the center we interpret as a tactic calculated to obfuscate his unshakable strategic objective, which is to turn this country into a European-style social democracy while diminishing the leading role it has played in the world since the end of World War II. The Democrats have persistently denied that these are Mr. Obama's goals, but they have only been able to do so by ignoring or dismissing what Mr. Obama himself, in a rare moment of candor, promised at the tail end of his run for the presidency: "We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America."This statement, coming on top of his association with radicals like Bill Ayers, Jeremiah Wright and Rashid Khalidi, definitively revealed to all who were not wilfully blinding themselves that Mr. Obama was a genuine product of the political culture that had its birth among a marginal group of leftists in the early 1960s and that by the end of the decade had spread metastatically to the universities, the mainstream media, the mainline churches, and the entertainment industry. Like their communist ancestors of the 1930s, the leftist radicals of the '60s were convinced that the United States was so rotten that only a revolution could save it.I disagree with those of my fellow conservatives who maintain that Mr. Obama is indifferent to "the best interests of the United States" (Thomas Sowell) and is "purposely" out to harm America (Rush Limbaugh). In my opinion, he imagines that he is helping America to repent of its many sins and to become a different and better country. But I emphatically agree with Messrs. Limbaugh and Sowell about this president's attitude toward America as it exists and as the Founding Fathers intended it. That is why my own answer to the question, "What Happened to Obama?" is that nothing happened to him. He is still the same anti-American leftist he was before becoming our president, and it is this rather than inexperience or incompetence or weakness or stupidity that accounts for the richly deserved failure both at home and abroad of the policies stemming from that reprehensible cast of mind.Hmmmm.....Ever considered he might be doing it intentionally?Read the full story here

• Barack Obama rejects calls for Eric Holder to resign.(Politico).President Barack Obama has forcefully rejected calls for Attorney General Eric Holder to resign over a controversial federal law enforcement operation that allegedly allowed hundreds of guns to flow to Mexican drug cartels.Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.) and the National Rifle Association have called for Holder's resignation over "Operation Fast and Furious," the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco Firearms and Explosives investigation that monitored suspicious gun sales. Several of the weapons have been recovered from drug gangs in Mexico and two guns were found at the scene of the shooting death of a U.S. Border Patrol Agent last December.However, when asked at a roundtable with Spanish-language print media on Monday whether Holder should quit, Obama said flatly, "No.""He was kind of uncomfortable with the question, I'd say," one of the journalists on hand, Antonieta Cadiz of La Opinion, said. (Read her story Google Translation into English here.)Holder has ordered an Office of Inspector General probe into "Fast and Furious," which is also being investigated by Congress. The attorney general said last week that the practice of "gun-walking" allegedly involved in the ATF operation was "not an appropriate technique.""That is not a technique that should ever be used," Holder told a news conference at the Justice Department.Hmmmm........"Gunwalker" These boots will go on walking, one of these days they'll walk all over you.Read the full story here.

• Great News: NLRB Refuses to Comply With House Subpoena.(DougRoss).What does it mean when the Executive branch of government -- in this case, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) -- refuses to comply with a lawful subpoena? Helpful Hint: Can you say "Constitutional Crisis"? House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) [said] on Friday that the National Labor Relations Board had refused to comply with a subpoena the committee issued on Sunday. The subpoena asked for documents related to the NLRB’s action against Boeing, and requested they be sent by today at noon.“The National Labor Relations Board and Acting General Counsel Lafe Solomon have thus far failed to comply with a lawful subpoena,” Issa said in a statement Friday afternoon. “This refusal by NLRB to abide by the law further heightens concerns that this is a rogue agency acting improperly. The integrity of NLRB and its leadership is clearly in question...” The public has a right to know the truth about why a government agency would choose to take action to benefit organized labor that threatens thousands of non-union jobs in South Carolina while setting a precedent impacting manufacturers across the country. It is imperative that Congress get complete facts about NLRB’s decision-making process in this matter. Its continued refusal to fully cooperate will not deter this Committee as it moves forward in efforts to determine what occurred and to hold NLRB officials to account.Needless to say, this incident can be added to President Obama's Complete List of Historic Firsts. And a word of warning for the Marxist Left: lawlessness begets lawlessness.Hmmmm......The rise of the dictatorship begins. Read the full story here.

• US Aid to Gaza to continue as Hamas and USAID reach compromise.(AlArabiya).The Palestinian movement Hamas and the US Agency for International Development have reached a compromise to maintain the flow of aid, a senior Hamas official said Saturday.“We’ve reached a compromise with USAID through the United Nations” to allow the continuation of aid, which was suspended by Washington on Friday, the official of the Islamist movement controlling the Palestinian enclave told AFP.Hamas, as a result of the agreement, renounces for a “three-month period” its demand to verify the accounts of NGOs financed by the US Agency for International Development in the Palestinian territories, he said.“We are keen on the continuation of the international institutions’ work and their services to our people,” he said.The Hamas official, who participated in the mediated talks, said the sides were working towards an agreement on mechanisms that ensure “transparency and internal accountability of these international organizations.”There will be “no control over their work,” he added.A US official on Friday said USAID was halting humanitarian assistance to the Gaza Strip over alleged meddling by Hamas, which Washington and Israel designate as a terrorist organization.“We deeply regret that USAID-funded partner organizations 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.“Hamas, through a series of measures it has imposed over the past months, has created an environment which jeopardizes the ability of non-governmental organizations to provide assistance to Gaza’s most vulnerable residents,” the official said.He said all US partner organizations would suspend their activities funded by the United States until these are able “to operate without interference or harassment from Hamas.”Another official in Washington said he understood that Hamas has been demanding access to physically search files and records of NGOs, which would be unprecedented.Referring to NGO the International Medical Corps (IMC), the first official said that when “the organization objected to the unwarranted audits, Hamas responded by closing down the organization’s office in Gaza.“These types of physical searches of NGO offices and records are unprecedented and represent a significant increase in the harassment of humanitarian relief and development organizations operating in Gaza.”Hamas insisted on Friday that it should be able to verify the accounts of NGOs financed by USAID in the Palestinian territories.The movement’s spokesman Taher al-Nunu complained that “USAID refuses to recognize the government in Gaza,” adding that anyone who “wishes to work in Palestinian territory must obey its laws.”Reacting to the situation, Palestinian economy minister Hassan Abu Libdeh called on Hamas to “abstain from any action that threatens relations with the NGOs.”Saying the NGOs were dedicated to “rebuilding Gaza,” Mr. Abu Libdeh said that “any halt to their activities will have grave consequences.”Hmmmm......Hamas still getting indirectly Aid from the Obama administration, and what happens in three months?Read the full story here.

• Turkey isn’t ruling out international intervention in Syria.(HurriyetDaily).Turkey isn’t ruling out international intervention in Syria if the Bashar al-Assad regime doesn’t stop using violence against its own people, a Turkish official speaking on condition of anonymity told the Hürriyet Daily News on Friday.The source also said that a letter from Turkish President Abdullah Gül to Assad delivered by Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu on Tuesday was considered by Ankara as an “ultimatum” to Damascus that, if violence by Syrian troops continued, Assad would no longer be able to rely on Turkey’s friendship.“Up until eight months ago, we were trying to convince our Western allies to give some more time for Assad to implement reforms. We were as friendly as to convene joint Cabinet meetings and lift visas,” the source told the Daily News. “But if a regime is not listening to the advice of its friend and neighbor and continues opening fire on its own people, that regime can no longer be Turkey’s friend.”Another factor why Turkey’s patience is “being exhausted,” as Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan says, is the open support that the Iranian government has declared for the Syrian government.“Syria is already ruled by a religious minority that is close to the Shiite majority in Iran,” the source said. “A further escalation of tension might lead to sectarian fights not only in Syria but also in Iraq, and Turkey is naturally uncomfortable, having relatives from all Islamic sects in the region on both sides of the border.”Read the full story here.

• Shell battles to repair leak after oil spill in the North Sea.(DailyMail).A leak has been discovered on a North Sea oil platform owned by Royal Dutch Shell.The company said it was working to repair the leak at a site 112 miles east of Aberdeen. It has not confirmed how much oil has been spilt. The seepage was found in a flow line connecting an oil well to the Gannet Alpha platform.A clean-up vessel and spotter plane have been sent to the site. A Shell spokesman said: 'We can confirm we are managing an oil leak in a flow line that serves the Shell-operated Gannet Alpha platform. We deployed a remote-operated vehicle to check for a subsea leak after a light sheen was noticed in the area. 'We have stemmed the leak significantly and we are taking further measures to isolate it. The subsea well has been shut in, and the flow line is being de-pressurised.'A spokesman for the UK Department of Energy and Climate Change said they were responding to the incident and will investigate accordingly. 'We understand from Shell that there is a finite amount of oil that can be released,' he added. Scotland's Green party co-leader Patrick Harvie said the spill highlights the need for oil companies to release proper response plans. 'It's too early to tell how serious this spill is, but it is imperative now that Shell act both urgently and efficiently,” he said. 'They must also keep the public and the authorities properly informed about progress, something BP failed to do during the Gulf of Mexico disaster last year.'Whatever the outcome of this incident, it certainly underlines the need for the oil industry to publish proper response plans, as Greenpeace have been asking them to do. If they refuse to do so, ministers should act to make it a condition of their licences.'Juliet Swann, of environmental charity Friends of the Earth Scotland, said: 'Given the massive economic importance of the North Sea to Scotland's rural and business economy, the news that there has been an oil spill in our seas is deeply disturbing.'Friends of the Earth Scotland strongly feels that the ongoing exploitation of increasingly hard to drill oil in the North Sea is potentially hugely damaging to Scotland's coastal communities, fishing industry and economy. RSPB Scotland director Stuart Housden said: 'We need to know the type of oil, how much has been released, the local weather conditions and the readiness to deal with any problems.'These data are vital for proper contingency planning. This area of the North Sea is full of young seabirds dispersing from breeding colonies from Shetland to the Aberdeenshire coast.'Greenpeace also demanded details on the spill, including how large it was.Greenpeace oil campaigner Ben Ayliffe said: 'Right now we don't know how serious this is.'What we do know is that the North Sea is supposed to be ultra-safe - we're told spills can't happen there.'Shell is looking to move into the Arctic where an oil spill would be all but impossible to clean up. Events in the North Sea should give the company pause for thought.'Read the full story here.

• Plaintiffs Score Early Victory Against Turkish Banks in Armenian Genocide Lawsuit.(Aina)By Diane Rumbaugh.Los Angeles -- On August 2, 2011, a U.S. federal district court in Los Angeles handed Armenian plaintiffs an early victory in what will surely be a difficult legal battle over reparations for land seized from Armenians in Turkey during the Armenian Genocide (Alex Bakalian et. al vs. Republic of Turkey, the Central Bank of Turkey, and T.C. Ziraat Bankasi et. al, Case Number 2:10-CV-09596, December 15, 2010). Nearly eight months after the complaint was filed, the court determined that all three defendants, in a first-of-its-kind lawsuit in the United States, had been lawfully served.The lawsuit, filed by descendants of Armenian Genocide victims, accuses the defendants of stealing and then profiting from land that was illegally seized during the Armenian Genocide, when the Ottoman Turks drove Armenians from the Adana region of southern Turkey. The property at issue in the lawsuit is currently part of a strategic U.S. airbase in southern Turkey.Representing the plaintiffs are the Yeghiayan Law Firm in Glendale, Schwarcz, Rimberg, Boyd & Rader, LLP in Los Angeles and Michael Bazyler from Chapman University School of Law in Orange.The plaintiffs have spent recent months attempting to serve all the defendants, and then to have the court affirm their service efforts. In the August 2 order, the court denied Central Bank of Turkey and Ziraat Bank's motion to dismiss the complaint for insufficient service of process. The court acknowledged that the plaintiffs presented "credible evidence that their process servers made several attempts to serve the bank defendants at addresses in "New York City… [and] were repeatedly denied access to the buildings and [were even]…misdirected as to Ziraat Bank's actual location."The court further found that the banks' security guards had "engaged in behavior apparently designed to thwart service of process." The banks did not deny having actual knowledge of the pending lawsuit, and thus the court ordered them to serve a responsive pleading to the complaint by August 19.The court additionally recognize that the Republic of Turkey had also been recently served with the complaint through diplomatic channels--a lengthy process involving high-level contacts between the U.S. Embassy in Ankara, Turkey, and the Turkish Foreign Ministry--and must also file papers responding to the complaint by August 19."From the outset, the banks have sought to make it as difficult as possible to litigate this lawsuit," says Vartkes Yeghiayan with the Yeghiayan Law Firm. "Finally, after months of maneuvering and numerous attempts to evade service, the U.S. federal court has required all three defendants to respond to the Armenians' complaint."Read the full story here.

• 14 - year old girl in Uganda Loses Use of Legs after Leaving Islam for Christianity.(Compassdirect).Muslim father locked 14-year-old in room with almost no food or water for months.NAIROBI, Kenya, August 11 (CDN) — A 14-year-old girl in western Uganda is still unable to walk 10 months after her father tortured her for leaving Islam and putting her faith in Christ, according to area Christians. Susan Ithungu of Isango village, Kasese district, has been hospitalized at Kagando Hospital since October 2010 after neighbors with police help rescued her from her father, Beya Baluku. He was arrested shortly afterward but quickly released, sources said.Susan and her younger brother, Mbusa Baluku, lived alone with their father after he divorced their mother. In March 2010 an evangelist from Bwera Full Gospel Church spoke at Susan’s school, and she decided to trust Christ for her salvation. “I heard the message of Christ’s great love of him dying for us to get everlasting peace, and there and then I decided to believe in Christ,” she said from her hospital bed. “After a month, news reached my father that I had converted to Christianity, and that was the beginning of my troubles with him. Our father warned us not to attend church or listen to the gospel message. He even threatened us with a sharp knife that he was ready to kill us in broad daylight in case we converted to Christianity.” Pastor Joseph Baluku of Bwera Full Gospel Church in Kasese said neighbors took her to the government hospital about 45 kilometers (28 miles) from Kasese town after she was freed. “He locked her up in a room of the semi-permanent house for six months without seeing sunlight,” the pastor said. “The younger brother was warned not to tell anyone that Susan was locked up in a room and was not given any food.” Young Mbusa said that when their father was away, he roasted bananas for his sister.“I also dug a hole under the door, where I could pour water through,” he said. “My sister could drink the water using her tongue. But most days she could only feed on mud.”“The miserable young Susan was bony, very weak, and not able to talk or walk,” said the pastor. “Her hair had turned yellow, she had long fingernails and sunken eyes, and she looked very slim, less than 20 kilograms [44 pounds].”Members of the Full Gospel Church in Bwera prayed for her and visited her in the hospital, which like many government-subsidized hospitals in the region does not customarily bill until the patient is discharged, and at rates well below those of private hospitals. It is unknown when Susan will be released, but Pastor Baluku said area residents and church members will try to gather funds for medical costs incurred. The pastor said billing from such government hospitals can often be deferred until enough money is raised. “It could be a challenge, but we will try to do our best,” he said.“By God’s grace Susan is still alive,” he said after a visit last week. “Though she can’t walk, she can now talk. She is still feeding on soft foods. The great news is that Susan is still strong in the Lord Jesus Christ. She needs prayers and support, so that she can resume her education soon.”Read the full story here.

• Europe - Belgium city Antwerp leads Europe in cocaine use: report.(Emirate24/7).The Belgian city of Antwerp's waste water contains the highest cocaine levels of 21 European cities measured, pipping London and Amsterdam, media on Saturday quoted new research as showing.According to the preliminary findings of a study yet to be published, the west Belgian city was Europe's biggest user of the drug, "just" beating the readings of London and Amsterdam, Antwerp University researcher Alexander Van Nuijs was quoted as telling the Dutch-language Gazet van Antwerpen newspaper."We scanned the used water of 21 European cities for traces of cocaine, amphetamines, ecstasy, heroin and methadone," he said."The results will only be announced later in the year, but I can say that Antwerp, of all the cities, had the highest cocaine reading."There was a "very big" difference between the cocaine levels measured in the sewage water of Antwerp and that of Scandinavian cities, the researcher added.Read the full story here.

• Egypt - Veiled Egyptian Woman Kidnapped, Gang-Raped.(WomenAgainstSharia).From BikyaMasr:In a new indication that sexual violence is not restricted to how one dresses in Egypt, a fully-veiled woman was kidnapped and gang-raped for an entire day in Giza. Police arrested five men and have charged them with kidnapping, rape and robbery. Investigators are looking for another three suspects allegedly involved in the crime.The woman, 33, unidentified by local reports, was kidnapped from the neighborhood of Imbaba by a Toktok driver, a small one-man motorbike vehicle that has linked to many crimes in the area, including many thefts.The Giza governorate has pushed efforts to regulate the transportation means, but has failed many times, including only the day before the start of the holy month of Ramadan.The woman was reportedly out buying groceries before three men dragged her into the vehicle, covered her eyes and took her to an unknown apartment. The three called five other friends and they all took turns raping her for a full day, according to the woman’s testimonies.The five who have been arrested have confessed to police and told them about the others who were involved in the crime. One of the arrested men had been released from prison three-months earlier, also kidnapping and raping a woman in the neighborhood of Haram, also in Giza.The woman also said that they stole a sum of 3,000 Egyptian pounds she was using to buy Ramadan groceries.Internationally Cairo is know for its safety, but growing and daily sexual harassment and assaults have left many questioning the city’s status.According to a 2008 study published by the Egyptian Center for Women’s Rights (ECWR) 60 percent of Egyptian women and 98 percent of foreign women are harassed on a daily basis. The ECWR warned that harassing foreign women would lead to the loss of millions of pounds. A number of foreigners said they would never return to Egypt. 14 percent of all foreign women said they would either never return to Egypt or tell their friends not to visit.With violence against women on the rise, many wonder if the authorities will do anything to impede these crimes.“The man was in jail before for kidnap and rape, yet he was let go and he did it again?” asked Mona Hassan, a 28-year-old researcher in Cairo. She then asked the question that is certain to be on many women’s minds in the near future: “What will they do now with these men? We need harsh laws that ensure a woman’s right to walk on the street. It is unacceptable what is happening to Egypt and its women.”Read the full story here.