MFS - The Other News

                        Morning Posting.

• Updated !Earthquakes in the last 24 hours in the world seismic activity Tonga 5.8 and Indonesia 5.7 ! More info here.

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

• The Congressional Budget Office reports that the “American Jobs Act” Would Increase 2012 Deficit By $288 Billion.(WeeklyStandard).The Congressional Budget Office reports that the “American Jobs Act” would make the federal deficit jump $288 billion in 2012. In other words, the 2012 deficit would rise by about twenty-five percent — from $1.2 trillion to $1.5 trillion. The most recent budget fight between Republicans and Democrats resulted in just a $22 billion cut to the 2012 deficit.The CBO predicts that over 10 years the American Jobs Act would raise enough taxes to pay for the short-term stimulus:

CBO estimates that enacting the bill would increase the budget deficit by $288 billion in 2012 and decrease deficits by $3 billion over the 2012–2021 period. That estimated deficit reduction of $3 billion over the coming decade is the net effect of $447 billion in additional spending and tax cuts in titles II through III and $450 billion in additional tax revenue from the offsets specified in title IV.

Congressional Republicans jumped on the new report to criticize the Democrats "spend now, pay later" approach. "So massive spending and deficits for a temporary stimulus bill now, paid for with a permanent tax hike," Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's spokesman Don Stewart wrote in an email to reporters.Read the full story here.

• Homeland Security Moves Forward with ‘Pre-Crime’ Detection.(CNet).An internal U.S. Department of Homeland Security document indicates that a controversial program designed to predict whether a person will commit a crime is already being tested on some members of the public voluntarily, CNET has learned.If this sounds a bit like the Tom Cruise movie called “Minority Report,” or the CBS drama “Person of Interest,” it is. But where “Minority Report” author Philip K. Dick enlisted psychics to predict crimes, DHS is betting on algorithms: it’s building a “prototype screening facility” that it hopes will use factors such as ethnicity, gender, breathing, and heart rate to “detect cues indicative of mal-intent.”FAST is designed to track and monitor, among other inputs, body movements, voice pitch changes, prosody changes (alterations in the rhythm and intonation of speech), eye movements, body heat changes, and breathing patterns. Occupation and age are also considered. A government source told CNET that blink rate and pupil variation are measured too.A field test of FAST has been conducted in at least one undisclosed location in the northeast. “It is not an airport, but it is a large venue that is a suitable substitute for an operational setting,” DHS spokesman John Verrico told Nature.com in May.Although DHS has publicly suggested that FAST could be used at airport checkpoints–the Transportation Security Administration is part of the department, after all–the government appears to have grander ambitions. One internal DHS document (PDF) also obtained by EPIC through the Freedom of Information Act says a mobile version of FAST “could be used at security checkpoints such as border crossings or at large public events such as sporting events or conventions.”Read the full story here.

• Remember Tariq Jahan? 'Hero' father who called for calm after son was mowed down and killed in the riots is charged after alleged road rage attack.(DailyMail).His dignified plea for calm just hours after the death of his son at the height of this summer’s looting was credited with averting a race riot.Tariq Jahan, 46, was praised by police, the Prime Minister and media alike for his decisive intervention in the street where, hours earlier, he had cradled his dying son, Haroon, 21.Even last week he was described as a ‘hero’ by shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper and days ago he was handed a Pride of Britain award by a national newspaper.But Mr Jahan delivered his call for calm while facing charges over an alleged attack which left a man seriously injured, it has emerged.Mr Jahan, who met the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge during their visit to Birmingham after the riots, is said to have punched a man in the face, breaking his jaw, in an alleged road rage incident in July.He was originally arrested on suspicion of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm – which carries a maximum penalty of life imprisonment – but now faces the lesser charge of inflicting grievous bodily harm without intent.Mr Jahan’s son and two friends were killed as they tried to defend a petrol station against looters on August 10 in Winson Green.Birmingham was left a tinderbox after it was confirmed that a man arrested on suspicion of murdering the Asians was black.Read the full story here.

• Turkey tells France to confront colonial past first.(HurriyetDaily).Turkey said France should confront its colonial past before giving lessons to others on how to face history, in an angry response today to a call by President Nicolas Sarkozy for Ankara to recognize the 1915 massacre of Armenians as genocide. Sarkozy, in Armenia on Thursday, challenged Turkey -- which is seeking membership of the European Union -- to face up to its past and threatened to pass a law in France that would make denying the genocide a crime.Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu told a news conference: "Those who will not be able to face their own history for having carried out colonialism for centuries, for treating foreigners as second-class people, do not have the right to teach Turkey a history lesson or call for Turkey to face its history."Davutoğlu said Turkey and Armenia were working together on ways to normalise ties and Sarkozy's comments would have a negative impact on reconciliation efforts.Armenia and Turkey, with the endorsement of the United States, the European Union and Russia, had agreed in 2009 to establish diplomatic ties and open their common border within two months of parliamentary approval.Sarkozy's remarks has fueled a response from Turkey's European Affairs Minister Egemen Bağış as well, who stated earlier today that the French president should abandon "the role of historian and put his mind to getting his country out of the economic gulf in which it finds itself."Hmmmm......Erdogan "Muslims don't commit Genocide".Read the full story here.

• Warning over France's Islamic suburbs which are becoming 'separate communities in a divided nation'.(DailyMail). France's run-down city suburbs are becoming ‘separate Islamic societies’ cut off from the state, a report has warned.Arab communities are increasingly rejecting French values and identity to immerse themselves in Muslim culture and lifestyle, it was found.Muslim pupils often boycott school dinners if the food is not halal and most Arabs oppose marriages to white French citizens, the study by respected political scientist Gilles Kepel revealed. As a result, France – whose five million Muslims make up Europe’s largest Islamic population – was turning into a ‘divided nation’, the study called Suburbs of the Republic found.Dr Kepel wrote: ‘In some areas, a third of the population of the town does not hold French nationality, and many residents are drawn to an Islamic identity rather than simply rejecting or failing to find a secular one.‘French schools, which are rigorously non-religious, have traditionally been seen as having the role of training young citizens of the republic. But local officials say Islamic pupils are heading home for a halal lunch.‘Most people in France do not object to mixed marriages, but in the suburbs we were surprised to find a very large proportion of Muslim respondents said they were opposed to marriages with non-Muslims.’The study was commissioned by the Institut Montaigne think-tank. It will make recommendations to the government in January.Hmmm......Michel Sardou got it right:"Ne m'appelez plus jamais France, La France elle m'a laissé tomber".Read the full story here.

• 'Abbas To Council of Europe: Palestinians Cannot Recognize Jewish State.(Memri).Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud 'Abbas said in a speech to a parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe that the demand for recognition of a Jewish state is a precondition for negotiations that the Palestinians cannot accept, because it could lead to a destructive religious struggle in the region, could endanger the1.25 million Palestinians who are Israeli citizens, and could abolish the refugees' rights. He accused Israel of ethnic cleansing in eastern Jerusalem and of conducting excavations that endanger the holy places, and said that Jerusalem will be a city open to all religions, with its eastern part the capital of Palestine and its western part the capital of Israel. He stressed that what is Arab will remain Arab, and what is Jewish will remain with them, and stated that he had reached an understanding with then-prime minister Ehud Olmert on this issue.Read the full story here.

• Hamas Official: 'If Only We Had Now 10 Martyrs'.(Memri).Hamas official Khalil Al-Haya has expressed the wish, "if only we had now 10 martyrs to carry out martyrdom operations." He added that this did not exist at the moment due to the security coordination. He denied that Hamas intended to move from Damascus to Tehran or Amman, and added that while Hamas believed that Palestine from the sea to the river was an Islamic Waqf that would be restored by means of the resistance, but that it would agree to a Palestinian state with the promise of a right of return and with granting a long-term hudna to the Zionist enterprise but without recognition of Israel's legitimacy.Read the full story here.

• Russia: Ex-Porn Star Receives Major Award at Muslim Film Festival.(RT).The Muslim Film Festival that took place in the Russian city of Kazan in September has ended up in a sex scandal. The issue related to a former porn actress who was awarded at the festival.The scandal allegedly emerged at the suggestion of the Tatarstan Muslims Spiritual leader Ildus Faizov. The Islamic activist addressed The Culture Ministry, roundly criticizing the festival. He noted his major disappointment in the choice of the Grand Prix winner. The award-winning German actress Sibel Kekilli is known for criticizing Islam and having starred in several porn films in the past. According to Faizov, Kekilli openly has stated her negative attitude to Islam, accusing the religion of including violence as one of its integral parts.Sibel Kekilli was named Best Actress for her role in German drama When We Leave. However, her name was not even mentioned on the festival’s website."Invited to the festival were figures of culture whose work does not have anything in common with the main idea of Muslim festival and contradicts generally accepted moral norms and Islam morality," the mufti said in his letter to the republican Culture Ministry cited on Friday by the Nezavisimaya Gazeta.According to Faizov, handing the award discredits both the muftiate and all Muslims of the republic.Deputy of Tatarstan Culture Minister Guzel Nigmatullina said the Board consulted organizers of the festival on all religious questions. However, Faizov refuted the official's statement saying that no consultations with spiritual leaders had taken place. The edition notes that Islam clergy of the republic has an opinion that awarding former porno actress with the prize and attempts to link contest choice with Islam clergy is an action aimed at discrediting Faizov known for his efforts to clear Tatar umma from radicals. Read the full story here and here.

• LIVING AT GROUND ZERO!By Allan Thompson -Toronto Star Staff Reporter.In a remote corner of Kazakstan, people were deliberately exposed to nuclear bomb tests.SEMIPALATINSK, Kazakstan - NADEZHDA LISOVETS was milking one of her cows when the earth trembled so violently that the frightened animals tried to run away. ``It was like an earthquake,'' Lisovets said, shaking her hospital bed with her hands to mimic the impact of one of the explosions at the Soviet nuclear testing site near her village of Buras, in northeastern Kazakstan. Between 1949 and 1989, nearly 500 nuclear tests were conducted at the so-called Polygon testing site on the rolling steppe near Semipalatinsk. As many as 166 of the blasts were above ground. ``They would happen on weekends. One Sunday, everything in the house shook. I had to grab the sideboard to keep the dishes from falling off and the table was shaking,'' Lisovets said. ``Nobody told us this could cause us any damage. But I know now the explosions were connected with my problems. I try not to think about it,'' Lisovets said, her eyes welling with tears. She closed her gown, reflexively trying to hide the fact that one of her breasts have been removed. Lisovets is dying of advanced breast cancer. She is one of tens of thousands of victims of radiation in a region plagued by abnormally high rates of birth defects, cancer, blood disease, immune deficiency, mental disability, suicide and psychological trauma. This is the place where the Cold War never ended. But, unlike Chernobyl, this was no nuclear accident. There is compelling evidence that Soviet authorities were aware, as early as the late 1950s, of the devastating impact of radiation on the local population. Top secret documents show the Soviet military deliberately used villagers as guinea pigs to gauge the potential impact of nuclear war. ``There's no place in the world that has inherited or suffered that kind of man-made disaster over a sustained period of time, affecting generations of people,'' said Herbert Behrstock, the United Nations' top representative in Kazakstan. ``People don't realize the magnitude of this and the continuing intensity,'' Behrstock said. The U.N. General Assembly in October called for a $43 million international aid package for the devastated communities around Semipalatinsk. Kazakstan, which closed the test site in 1991 shortly after gaining independence, is desperately poor despite its mineral wealth. The government has done little for victims of radiation. Authorities estimate more than 1.2 million people were adversely affected by nuclear testing. About 67,000 people who lived in villages located within 100 kilometres of the test site at the time of the explosions received the highest doses of radiation. They have passed the genetic defects on to offspring. By 1989, when testing ended and KGB officials were frantically destroying documents, Gusev was determined to safeguard as much of the historical record as possible. He took three sacks of records earmarked for incineration and hid them in a closet in a relative's home. He then filled the empty sacks with magazines and newspapers, which he took to the incinerator. He gave a list of the ``destroyed'' documents to Soviet authorities. After analyzing the documents, Gusev concluded the Soviet military deliberately staged as many explosions as possible during bad weather, when skies were overcast, increasing radioactive fallout by up to 20 times. ``Why couldn't they just wait a day or two, until the skies were clear and the fallout would be less?'' Gusev asks. ``Because they wanted to see what the effect of the explosion would be on a real population. ``It was a crime against humanity,'' Gusev said. The legacy of the tests is clear at the Semipalatinsk cancer hospital, where Lisovets came for her breast cancer operation. One-third of patients show up for treatment when they are beyond help; many cancer victims never bother coming to hospital at all. Toleubek Ukbenov, director of the Centre for Psychiatric Health in Semipalatinsk said the region suffers from abnormally high rates of mental disability at birth, various neuroses and suicide. ``It's not a very scientific observation, but too often we see the closing of one cemetery and the opening of a new one,'' Ukbenov said. ``These days, we're surprised when someone dies of old age.''Read the full story here.