MFS - The Other News

                    Morning Posting.

• Updated !Earthquakes in the last 24 hours in the world seismic activity situation Japan 6.0 - 5.7 - 5.2 ; Tonga 5.2 !More info here.

• Obama Plans to Create Internet ID for All Americans.(Fox).President Obama is putting plans in motion to give the Commerce Department authority to create an Internet ID for all Americans, a White House official told CNET.com.White House Cybersecurity Coordinator Howard Schmidt told the website it is "the absolute perfect spot in the U.S. government" to centralize efforts toward creating an "identity ecosystem" for the Internet.The National Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace is currently being drafted by the Obama administration and will be released by the president in a few months."We are not talking about a national ID card. We are not talking about a government-controlled system. What we are talking about is enhancing online security and privacy, and reducing and perhaps even eliminating the need to memorize a dozen passwords, through creation and use of more trusted digital identities," Commerce Secretary Gary Locke said at an event Friday at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, according to CNET.com.Hmmmm......This is the kind of totalitarian, policestate Stalin loved.Who's going to be Beria?Read the full story here.

• New Strain of Swine Flu (H3N2v) Detected in U.S. with Potential for H2H Transmission.(Shenandoah).By John Galt.Why is this story so disturbing? Because of the timing, an election year with radical Islamist terrorism on the rise, and the worldwide economy facing collapse on any unanticipated event. These two sentences from the story are alarming to anyone who remembers the Avian Flu and prior Swine Flu scares: The 12 people with the new swine flu strain live in Indiana, Iowa, Maine, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. Officials for the Centers for Disease Control say the sample size of H3N2 infections is too small to know whether it will pose a threat to the population at large.“It’s a very small sample and it’s geographically spread, which makes it more difficult to get a handle on it,” says Jeffrey Dimond, a CDC spokesman. “Most of the cases have come through direct contact with the animals, through the 4H Club and that sort of thing.”Let’s hope that the unusually warm winter does not provide the fertile ground necessary for this virus to become virulent and expand rapidly with H2H (Human to Human) characteristics.Hmmm......Five different States?Read the full story here.

• Former US President Jimmy Carter "pleased" with Egypt polls.(YME).Former US president Jimmy Carter gave the thumbs up on Tuesday to Egypt's parliamentary elections, saying the people's will was "expressed accurately.""We have been very pleased," Carter told reporters during a tour of a polling station at the Rod al-Farag girls' secondary school in a working class district of the Egyptian capitalHe said the election -- a three-staged process launched in November to choose the first parliament since mass protests forced former president Hosni Mubarak to quit -- had been peaceful despite "some problems.""But in general the will of the people has been expressed accurately," he said on the eve of the end of the polls.The Carter Center is one of the few monitoring group to have had a licence to witness the election, and the former US president will hold a news conference on Friday.Carter arrived in Egypt on Monday to join a Carter Center delegation of 40 witnesses representing 21 countries deployed in Egypt since mid-November, the statement added.Egypt's two main Islamist parties have scored a crushing victory in the seats declared so far, reflecting a regional trend since Arab Spring uprisings overthrew authoritarian secular regimes.Asked about Islamists coming to power, Carter said: "I have no problem with that. The US government has no problem with that either."The powerful Muslim Brotherhood, the country's best organised political movement, has claimed the lead through its political arm, the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP).#FJP Chairman received former US president Jimmy Carter, discussed elections, and Palestinian issue.Hmmmmm.....Obama's 'GoBetween'?Read the full story here.

• Huge Error Rate In Same Day Election Registrations Found.(BigGovernment).This report by a Wisconsin Tea Party group is absolutely shocking.MacIver News Service | January 11, 2012 | [Milwaukee, Wisc] A shocking new report by a Wisconsin Tea Party group raises serious questions about the diligence of poll workers in Milwaukee County.The group, Wisconsin Grandsons of Liberty, found errors on more than one third of all Election Day Registration forms completed for the April 5, 2011 election in Milwaukee County.“We discovered 3,739 forms with errors,” said Larry Gamble, the groups’ spokesperson. “That 33.7% error rate is high enough to question the entire election process and raises doubts about having the accuracy and accountability required to properly manage elections.”The study was performed by members of the self-described pro-Constitution group between May and December, 2011.The group did not examine existing registrations, early absentee and in-person, early absentee voting documents.The report was released more than nine months after the election due to the volume of forms and the cost associated with properly redacting identifiable personal information.The report indicates that f the 11,107 forms examined, 3,739 or 33.7% contained errors of some type. In 1,425 cases the election Registrar failed to annotate Proof of Residency of the voter.Only 1 voter completing an Election Day Registration was required to cast a provisional ballot, the report notes.“We were told this is the first time anyone has done this kind of post-election analysis in the County,” Gamble told MacIver News Service. “it just floored me to discover they don’t conduct routine quality control checks like this after the election.”Some of the examples highlighted in the report include:

•In the City of Milwaukee, Dist 1, a voter used only a magazine subscription invoice as proof of residence, then vouched for someone else’s residency.

•1,021 Election Day Registration forms in City of Milwaukee had the proof of residency left blank.

•In Greenfield, a voter used their Ohio driver’s license and a passport as proof that they lived in Wisconsin. That same person then corroborated for someone else with the same last name and at the same address, who also only a had passport.

•A voter used a Traffic Citation from the State of Illinois to prove Wisconsin Residency.Read the full story here.

• Unconstitutional Recess Appointments Haven’t Helped Obama in the Polls.(Cato).By Mark A. Calabria. It has just been over a week since President Obama made his “recess” appointments to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the National Labor Relations Board. I suggested last week that this might turn out to be Obama’s “Court-Packing” moment, where he begins to discover that (some) Americans actually do care about the Constitution. While its clearly too early to say anything with certainty, it appears I may have been correct.On January 3th, the day before the appointments, Obama’s job approval ratings, according to RealClearPolitics, averaged 47.2 approval and 47.8 disapproval. Basically a tie.Today, his job approval is at 44.5 and disapproval is 50.3. Moving over the course of a week from a tie to a spread of almost 6 percentage points. Usually we have not seen such large changes over the course of a week. Now obviously one cannot contribute all this decline to the recess appointments, but there were no other big Presidential announcements or even big economic news over the last week that could account for such a slide in support. So while this doesn’t prove anything, it does suggest these appointments, even if they are making his base happy, are coming at the expense of the support of independents.Read the full story here.

• Member of Kuwaiti royal family embraces Christ!(MohabatNews).This Kuwaiti prince announced, "First of all, I totally agree with the distribution of this audio file and I now declare that if they kill me because of this audio file, then I'll go into the presence of Jesus Christ and be with him for all eternity."Iranian Christian News Agency Mohabat News – Al-haqiqa, a Christian Arabic satellite T.V., which broadcasts Christian programs, played an audio file which it attributed to a Kuwaiti prince called "Abdollah Al-sabah".The T.V. channel claimed that Prince Abdollah Al-sabah comes from a Kuwaiti royal family which currently governs the country. The channel also said that the prince recently denounced his Islamic faith and became a Christian.The voice in the audio file introduced himself as Abdollah Al-sabah and stated, "First of all, I totally agree with the distribution of this audio file and I now declare that if they kill me because of this audio file, then I'll go into the presence of Jesus Christ and be with him for all eternity.""I'm satisfied with whatever they do to me, because the truth in the Bible has guided me to the right way".Regarding the Islamic groups who have recently gained power in Egypt, this Kuwaiti prince also stated, "Islamic communities have always wanted to attack in different parts of the world but God has preserved the world and still protects it. This is why we have recently seen disagreements appearing among Islamic groups who are now fighting with each other. They are about to divide further into different groups.This piece of news made headlines briefly on Arabic News wires and also in the Iranian government run news agency. Some independent Shiite websites contradicted this report and quoted another Kuwaiti prince, Azbi Al-sabah as saying, "there is no one in the Kuwaiti royal family by that name."Kuwait is a Middle Eastern country, neighboring Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Iran across the Persian Gulf. Its capital city is also called Kuwait.Islam is the official and dominant religion in Kuwait and almost the entire population is Muslim. Only 4% of the population is Christian and there is a tiny group of other religions. Article 2 of the Kuwaiti constitution reads, "Islam is the official religion in the country and Sharia is a main source for legislation."Hmmmm..........Jesus said "...you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." ~ John 8:32.Read the full story here.

• Turkey, US planning Syria no-fly zone: Russian secretary.(HurriyetDaily).NATO and Gulf countries are trying to go from indirect meddling in Syria's internal affairs to a direct military intervention, Russia’s National Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev said today. Patrushev assessed the situation in the Middle East in an interview with Interfax agency, the website of the Voice of Russia reported. Patrushev said Turkey and the United States were planning to create a no-fly zone in Syria to secure a base for the country’s opposition. According to Patrushev, Turkey, which had "excellent" relations with Syria until recently, is vying for influence in the Middle East with Iran. The reason for a military intervention in Syria would be Damascus’ close ties with Tehran, Patrushev said, and not the crackdown on the opposition by the Bashar al-Assad regime. "The West fears that weapons and ammunition go through Syria to Iran, Lebanon and the Hezbollah," Patrushev said. Another reason for a military operation into Syria would be to punish the Syrian state for being the only country that supports Iran in the region. "It was the only country that gave a hand to Iran during the war with Iraq," says Patrushev.Read the full story here.

• Now We Will See The Real Obama.(PointsandFigures).By JeffCarter.Bill Daley leaving the Obama administration was big news for ten minutes. But as my friend Streetwise Professor and I discussed on Twitter after the news broke, this really signals a big change in direction on how Obama will campaign.It’s going to get really ugly. How ugly? Think of the election cycle from 1796-1804. It will be that ugly. The culmination of those election cycles was a duel by Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr, with Hamilton losing his life after the gun battle.Both Hamilton and Jefferson manipulated the press of that time to scandalize the other side. Character assassination is a mild phrase to use when describing the vitriol that went back and forth. Look for more in the coming months.It takes a thick skin to be a politician, but in Chicago, no one ever plays fair. The game is rigged before the ballots are printed. They say backroom politics are dead, but the political bosses in Chicago are alive and well. As Craig correctly points out, what you just saw in the White House was a street fight from Chicago manifesting itself into an internal power struggle in Washington.Even though they are all Democrats, there are still big political divisions within Chicago. Mayor Daley’s special talent was mitigating the special interests of all the factions. Truly, it is a special skill that should be admired and not chided, even though he accomplished it on the back of the tax payer. Daley would be an excellent CEO of a large company. I have a lot of respect for him. He is an extremely bright and energetic person. He isn’t a political hack.  There are different kinds of Democrats in Chicago. You need to know the species before you jump to conclusions. Nothing happens in a vacuum, and nothing happens without a consensus.The last kind of Democrat in Chicago are the true believers. They are idealistic and actually think that systems of organizing people like socialism and communism are the best methods. They idealize China. The fact that huge cities can be built at the twitch of a government finger with no concern for property rights is enticing to them. The true believers don’t believe in a single class system like they say. There is a small cadre of hand picked ruling class people, and then the rest of the poor stiffs. Bill Ayers is one person at the idealogical center of a system like this. Ayers had many predecessors in Chicago and this sort of “true believer” Democrat culture runs very deep. The tentacles of the true believer culture reach all over Chicago. Recall, the Haymarket riots were here. Upton Sinclair did his best work here. Studs Terkel was a true believer. There is a DNA that runs very deep in certain parts of the city which exemplifies this sort of system. Barack Obama is a person that came from this part of city politics. There are many others, but for them a large government apparatus that directs all traffic and makes all decisions is the way to run a society. Many of the true believers ally themselves with the practitioners of racial politics because they see that as a means to an endgame. Then there are the Democrats that are the connectors. David Axelrod is a true believer that is a connector. He is good with the turn of a phrase to mask what they truly want and turn it into something saleable to the American public. The Clinton’s had their own machine which some Chicago folks were a part of. But their idea of political combat was a scorched earth policy. Chicago operators are much more pragmatic than that.  Obama’s mission was to ingrain that sort of crony capitalist machine into the fabric of national politics. One look at all the waivers given to his cronies for Obamacare shows you where he is headed. If Obama and his compatriots get there way, every business, man, woman and child will have to bow their head and kiss a ring to get anything done.  Those true believers are dangerous. People like Ayers want the traditional America destroyed. Sometimes they do make mistakes. They believe so deeply in the idealistic nation state they envision, that they lose sight of what is really happening on the ground. I think Daley leaving the White House is one of those times. Valerie Jarrett and the practitioners of her style of politics are running the show. Let’s work hard to inform Americans so they don’t buy what she is selling. Had Daley held sway, we would have seen a different more palatable direction.  If you don’t play the game, your taxes go up. Inspectors harass you constantly. Your garbage may not be picked up regularly. Your building always seems to have police around it ticketing cars and trucks making deliveries. Operating your business becomes a nightmare and you might sell your business at a loss. Odds are good a connected businessman buys it.That’s the world that Obama wants to bring to Washington DC..Hmmmm...... "I'll make them an offer they can't refuse"?Read the full story here.

• NO Jews Allowed!(AlexanderMunch).
• Washington Post Egypt on Wednesday canceled a Jewish festival held in the Nile Delta each year, citing concerns about the local response to heightened security at a time of uncertainty between Egypt and Israel. Foreign Ministry spokesman Amr Roshdi said the decision...Israel National News Known as the Avir Yaakov and Abu Hasira, he passed away in 1880 in Egypt on his way from Morocco to the Land of Israel. In the past Egyptian protesters affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood have attempted to physically block any Jewish worshipers...
• Al Jazeera 31 Egypt political groups has told Israel it would not be "appropriate" for Israeli pilgrims to make an annual visit to the tomb of a 19th-century Jewish holy man in the Nile Delta, officials say. The Egyptian foreign ministry said on Wednesday it had notified Israel...Indian Express Ceremonies at the tomb of Rabbi Yaakov Abu Hatizra have triggered yearly political sparring in Egypt throughout most of the last decade, with Islamists, nationalists, and others claiming that the government by allowing the pilgrimage is pursuing an...
• The Daily Star Egyptian Islamists and other activists say they have vowed to prevent Israelis from making an annual pilgrimage to the tomb of a 19th-century Jewish holy man in the Nile Delta. Leading parliamentarian from the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood Gamal...Read and see the full story here.

• "All-American Muslim" Stars Busted for Marijuana Possession at Canadian Border.(Freep).Two reality TV stars from TLC’s “All-American Muslim” show found some real life drama at the Ambassador Bridge recently: Authorities said they were caught with pot at the border.It happened on New Year’s Day, according to Ron Smith, spokesman for Customs and Border Protection in Detroit.Smith told the Free Press today that two cast members of the TLC reality show were caught with 9 grams of marijuana in the trunk while trying to cross into the U.S. from Windsor. The cast members – a man and a woman -- were not named by authorities. One of them, Smith said, had a medical marijuana card, although federal law does not recognize the card.TLC declined to comment.According to Smith, the two travelers had to pay a $500 civil fine for failing to declare the bag of weed to border agents.He explained how it all went down: At the first checkpoint after crossing the bridge, an officer decided to pull the two passengers over for inspection after asking them a series of routine questions. The officer, Smith noted, did not recognize the travelers from the TV show.“Some officers will look in a lot of trunks. This officer picked their trunk to look in,” Smith said.But inside the inspection area, Smith said, some officers and bystanders recognized the pair from the show. During the inspection, an officer checked the trunk and found a weed-like substance in a small bag – enough to roll about 10 joints.The travelers were released because, as Smith explained, nine grams of marijuana doesn’t warrant prosecution.“This wasn’t a criminal matter, it was a civil matter,” Smith said, adding. “It’s very hard to get someone to prosecute for something that small.” Read the full story here.

• Obama to ‘take on’ Netanyahu after election?Palestinians say White House asked them to delay demands till 2nd term.(WND).By AaronKlein.JERUSALEM – The Obama administration asked the Palestinian Authority not to make any major demands until after the presidential election in November, a senior PA official told WND.The PA official, speaking on condition his name be withheld, said that Obama promised to renew stalled Israeli-Palestinian negotiations on the basis of the 1967 borders, meaning an Israeli withdrawal from eastern sections of Jerusalem as well as from Judea and Samaria, also referred to as the West Bank.“We were asked by the (U.S.) administration not to make special demands or scandals during the elections,” said the official.“After elections, the negotiations will be renewed on basis of the Clinton plan and Obama’s speech in Cairo of the 1967 borders,” the official said.The Clinton plan is a reference to the formula used during the Camp David negotiations in the summer of 2000 that saw sections of Jerusalem in which Jews predominantly live go to Israel, while areas inhabited by Arabs would become a Palestinian state. The negotiations also called for a nearly complete Israeli evacuation of the Gaza Strip and West Bank.WND previously reported that several major purported Arab neighborhoods in Jerusalem are actually built illegally on Jewish-owned land, resulting in an Arab majority in those sections.This is not the first time the PA claimed the Obama administration asked it to hold off until after this year’s election.Last September, WND quoted a top PA official saying the Obama administration told the Palestinian Authority it cannot significantly help advance a Palestinian state until after the election.The official, however, said the U.S. will press for a Palestinian state quickly if President Obama is reelected.“The main message we received from the U.S. is that nothing will happen in a serious way before the 2012 elections,” said the official.Earlier this month, Washington Post columnist David Ignatius said he expected Obama to “take on” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a second presidential term.Appearing as a panel member on the syndicated “Chris Matthews Show,” Ignatius stated: “What I hear from the White House is looking towards a second term on foreign policy, which I cover, as an opportunity to do the broad things that would establish an Obama agenda. He came into office passionate about the Middle East, about the Palestinian issue. I’d see him taking another really strong crack at that.”“Go head to head with Netanyahu again?” Matthews then asked.“Yeah, and I think, this White House thinks … that he’s had success, that that’s an area. Who would have said that an anti-war President, candidate, four years ago, could run on a strong foreign policy record?”Hmmmm......Next time Obama would recognise Palestine.Read the full story here.

• Twitter protests Google’s new social search.(BikyaMasr).San Francisco (dpa) – Microblogging site Twitter on Wednesday criticized Google’s newly announced plans to include Google+ content into search results, saying the decision to omit Twitter feeds would compromise the search experience.“Twitter has emerged as a vital source of … real-time information, with more than 100 million users sending 250 million Tweets every day on virtually every topic,” the company said in a statement.“We’re concerned that as a result of Google’s changes, finding this information will be much harder for everyone. We think it’s bad for people, publishers, news organizations, and Twitter users.”Twitter’s complaint came just days after Google said it would integrate content from its social network Google+ into its search results so that users could see relevant information from their friends and contacts.Google called the new system, Search Plus Your World.However, because Google does not have agreements with Twitter or Facebook, information from those social networks will not be included in the Search Plus Your World results unless they are made available on publicly searchable websites.Google responded to Twitter’s complaints by noting that the microblogging site had declined to renew its agreement, which expired in July 2011, to let Google mine its content.“We are a bit surprised by Twitter’s comments about Search Plus Your World, because they chose not to renew their agreement with us last summer, and since then we have observed their … instructions.”Hmmmm........"The War of the [internet]Worlds" is on?Read the full story here.

• Why 308,127,404 Americans are going to get hosed.(SovereignMan).By SimonBlack.Last week, the US government’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), an agency of the US Treasury Department, published its 2011 annual report. There are a few numbers that are pretty startling.We’ve discussed before that FinCEN is the executive agency tasked with ensuring that every US banker is an unpaid government spy through Suspicious Activity Reports.A Suspicious Activity Report, or SAR, includes details of any transaction that may be deemed ‘suspicious’. Naturally, there’s no clear guidance on what is/is not considered suspicious. Banks, brokerages, money service businesses, precious metals dealers… even casinos are required by law to fill them out.If you withdraw an unusual amount of cash from your bank account, that could be deemed suspicious. If you set up a new payee in your billpay service, that could be deemed suspicious. Anything and everything is fair game.Banks and other businesses who do not fill out SARs face hefty penalties, including imprisonment. If they disclose to a customer that s/he is the subject of a SAR, they have hefty penalties, including imprisonment.When push comes to shove and they have to choose between a nasty penalty, or submitting a SAR about your unusual cash withdrawal, which option do you think they’ll pick?Unsurprisingly, nearly 1.5 million ‘suspicious activity reports’ were filed across the US banking system in 2011, well over twice the number reported in 2004. On top of this, there were an additional -14.8 million- ‘currency transaction reports’ filed in 2011, a 6% jump over last year.It’s an unfortunate trend which highlights not only the end of financial privacy, but also the massive amount of data being collected by the government to keep tabs on its citizens.According to this year’s report, a full 36 distinct federal law enforcement agencies requested information from FinCEN (and even more who haven’t). Three dozen. And that doesn’t include state or local law enforcement.That there are this many federal law enforcement agencies to begin with is mind-boggling… let alone the thought that some knucklehead at the Fish and Wildlife Service has access to bank records.This is one reason why international diversification is so important– the likelihood of such collection and monitoring is greatly reduced when you bank overseas. Moreover, should one of these dozens of agencies or courts decide that your ‘suspicious activity’ warrants locking you out of your accounts, they have zero jurisdiction overseas.This is a common tactic in the US; financial activity is one of the many, many areas with a ‘guilty until proven innocent’ burden of proof. You don’t even need to be doing anything wrong (which is the case most of the time this happens) for one of these agencies to freeze your account ‘pending investigation’ with a simple phone call. Good luck getting it unfrozen.Read the full story here.

• US military moves carriers, denies Iran link.(JPost).WASHINGTON - The US military said on Wednesday that a new aircraft carrier strike group had arrived in the Arabian Sea and that another was on its way to the region, but denied any link to recent tensions with Iran and portrayed the movements as routine.The shift in the powerful US naval assets comes at a moment of heightened tensions with Iran, which has threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz - the world's most important oil shipping lane - if US and EU sanctions over its nuclear program cut off its oil exports.The US military has said it will halt any blockade of the strategic strait and the top US naval officer acknowledged on Tuesday that preparing for a potential conflict there was something that "keeps me awake at night."Still, the Pentagon denied any direct link between recent tensions and the movement of aircraft carriers.Read the full story here.

• Top US official in talks with Muslim Brothers.(JPost).The chief assistant to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met on Wednesday with the head of the Muslim Brotherhood’s political party, Washington’s highest-level talks yet with the Islamist group that has dominated Egypt’s parliamentary elections.State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland confirmed that Burns had met with the Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), along with several other party representatives, at its new headquarters in Cairo.“From our perspective, it was an opportunity to hear from them and to reinforce our expectation that all the major parties will support human rights, tolerance, rights of women and will also uphold Egypt’s existing international obligations,” she said.Burns arrived in the Egyptian capital the day before and reportedly met with Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, the head of the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces.Last summer, Washington modified a long-standing ban on formal contacts with the Brotherhood. The administration has said it would pursue “limited contacts” and “re-engagement” with the Brotherhood after the party took about 40 percent of votes in parliamentary elections that followed the February overthrow of longtime president Hosni Mubarak.Jeffrey Feltman, the US assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, has already met with the FJP’s deputy leader.Burns did not meet on Wednesday with the hard-line Salafist Islamist party that came in second in parliamentary voting.“He was not able to meet with all of the parties, so this was a selective group of some of them,” Nuland said, adding that the Salafists had not been invited.“This was a chance to get to know some of the people that he wanted to get to know.”Egypt’s staggered three-stage parliamentary election began on November 28 and drew an unprecedented turnout. The lower house will hold its first session on January 23.Nuland said that Burns also met senior Egyptian officials to discuss recent government raids on US-backed non-governmental organizations that Washington has called “unacceptable.”“He reaffirmed our strong support [for the groups],” Nuland said.Hmmmm........"Burns did not meet on Wednesday with the hard-line Salafist Islamist party that came in second in parliamentary voting"probably did not see any Unicorns on the road eighter?Read the full story here.

• Recall notice for the Turkish model.(AsiaTimes).By Spengler.Among all the dumb things said about the so-called Arab Spring last year, perhaps the dumbest was the idea that the new democracies of the Arab world might follow the Turkish model. In fact, if you had invested in the Turkish model (that is, in the Turkish stock market) at the outbreak of the Arab revolts, you would have lost about half your money. If you leave your money in Turkey, you probably will lose the rest of it. Turkey is not a model. It is a bubble, and it is bursting, starting with the stock market and national currency. Turkey isn't democratic, as its volatile Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan reminded the world last week by arresting yet more journalists on trumped-up charges of coup plotting. According to Turkey's Journalists' Union, Turkey has jailed 97 writers, more than China, which no-one confuses with a model democracy. Nonetheless, Erdogan won Time Magazine's People's Choice poll to be its 2011 "Person of the Year". Being designated "Person of the Year" is not necessarily an endorsement. In 1938, Time's Man of the Year was Adolf Hitler. In 1939, it was Joseph Stalin. Like Stalin and Hitler, Erdogan's reputation has been more resilient than the country's stock market. The West still believes in its own ability to fix all the problems of the world, and cannot abide the thought that success is to be found nowhere in the Muslim world (not counting Malaysia and Indonesia). Now that Libya and Yemen are immersed in tribal warfare, Egypt is dissolving into chaos, Syria has dug in for a long sectarian bloodbath, and Iraq prepares for an ethno-confessional civil war, Turkey seems a pillar of stability by comparison. Not for long, if my calculations are correct. A disaster is in the making. Leave aside the economic ills of the southern Mediterranean generally, which will impinge Turkey's exports (about half of which go to the European community): Turkey's financial system is reaching the end of the rope. A sudden adjustment in the current account accompanied by large-scale bankruptcies among Turkish businesses and widespread unemployment will make 2012 an ugly year for the Turkish economy, and an even uglier year for Turkish politics. Read and see the full story here.

• 'Iran, Hezbollah providing weaponry to Assad'.(JPost).Iran and Hezbollah are actively assisting Syrian President Bashar Assad and providing him with weaponry as part of an effort to ensure that he survives in face of growing resistance and protests, head of Military Intelligence Maj.-Gen. Aviv Kochavi said on Wednesday.Kochavi spoke at the graduation ceremony for IDF intelligence officers.“The radical axis is trying to retain its power and as time passes, Iran and Hezbollah increase their efforts to help the Assad regime survive by providing intelligence, weaponry, and other capabilities- to the point where they are actively involved,” Kochavi said.The IDF intelligence chief said it was possible that in the long term the ongoing upheaval in the Middle East would have a positive outcome but in the immediate term “the dangers are increasing.”Kochavi's comments came a day after Turkish customs officials intercepted four trucks suspected of carrying military equipment from Iran to Syria.The governor of Kilis province said the trucks were confiscated at the Oncupinar border crossing into Syria after police received information about their cargo, according to Dogan news agency.Read the full story here.

• Belgium design duo alters Holocaust-themed fence.(JPost).A Belgiun design duo altered their design for a fence evoking the Buchenwald concentration camp following uproar by various groups in Europe, design website fastcodedesign.com reported Tuesday.Job Smeets and Nynke Tyangel, from Antwerp, designed a fence that consists of "two chimneys joined by an arch of smoke with a bell hanging from the middle."To cap it off, the design pair, called Studio Job, inscribed the bell with the words "To Each His Own," which translated to German are the words that adorned the Buchenwald entrance itself. According to the report, the project sparked public outrage across Europe. French European Jewish Congress president Moshe Kantor slammed the work, saying it trivialized the Holocaust.As a result of the outspoken criticism, the artists announced that they would alter the "original plans for the gate" inspired by the largest concentration camp on German soil. "We thoroughly regret it if this has caused upset and grief with parties affected by this, that has in no way been our intention," Studio Job wrote to fastcodedesign.com.Read the full story here.

• Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood wants military immunity for generals, activists cry foul.(BikyaMasr).CAIRO: In a move that has left many of the country’s activists angered, Egypt’s top political force the Muslim Brotherhood has said it was looking into a deal that would grant the ruling military junta immunity for alleged crimes committed against protesters since they took charge of the country in February last year.The move would ensure the military relinquish power and enable the transition to a newly elected legislative body, but activists who have faced the end of the military’s guns, are not convinced and have called it a means for the Brotherhood to assert more power.“What about the dozens of people who have been murdered by the military and the police under the military’s orders?” asked activist and protester Mahmoud Gama’a, who told Bikyamasr.com that the Brotherhood will face a backlash from protesters if they attempt to go forward with the idea.“We will not stand by and not have justice for what the military has done to Egyptian people. It is unacceptable that any political force thinks they can let the blood of martyrs not get justice,” he added.The goal of the Brotherhood is to create compromise within the country as their political arm, The Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) leads all voting with nearly 40 percent, ahead of a final vote count for the third and final round of parliamentary elections, which ended on Wednesday.Despite the idea being floated this week by top Brotherhood officials, activists say it will not stop their campaign to have the top generals tried for what they have regularly dubbed “crimes against humanity.”The military has been directly responsible for the killing of scores of citizens, attacking a peaceful Coptic Christian march on October 9, which killed at least 27 people.Then, in November, the military police attacked another peaceful sit-in in Tahrir Square, which led to 6 days of street battles in central Cairo, leaving at least 70 people dead, medical sources told Bikyamasr.com.And more recently, in mid-December, military police again attacked a peaceful sit-in at the country’s Cabinet building, reportedly torturing and beating a protester and then burning the makeshift tents that had been erected. For three days, the military used live ammunition and rocks against protesters, leaving at least 17 people dead.“This is not justice if they get immunity. It is a ploy by the Brotherhood to force people to forget what the military has done to us,” said female activist Mona Radwan, who told Bikyamasr.com that she would not rest until the military pays for their actions.“Women were forced into virginity tests, were stripped in public and beaten and killed, so why is this happening. I feel we have returned to pre-Mubarak times,” she said.But the Brotherhood said it would only move forward on the proposed deal if the families of those killed since February agreed, at least giving those who paid the ultimate sacrifice some semblance of an option.Read the full story here.

• Turkey halts Iranian arms corridor to Syria, balks at nuclear Iran.(Debka).When IDF Military Intelligence chief Maj.-Gen. Aviv Kochavi accused Iran and Hizballah Wednesday, Jan. 11of directly helping Bashar Assad repress the uprising against him with arms, Turkey had just taken a stand against the Iranian corridor running weapons to Syria via its territory, debkafile's military sources report.Earlier this week, Ankara reported halting five Iranian trucks loaded with weapons for Syria at the Killis Turkish-Syrian border crossing and impounding its freight. According to our intelligence sources, the Iranian convoy was not really stopped at Killis but at the eastern Turkish Dobubayazit border crossing with Iran, near Mount Ararat. This supply route for Syria had been going strong for months. Ankara's decision to suspend it has reduced its volume by 60 percent.The Turks kept very quiet about the Dogubayazit route because disclosure would have exposed them as working two sides of the Syrian conflict – letting Tehran set up a clandestine arms route for helping the Assad regime crack down on protest, while publicly posing as the leading champions of the Syrian protest movement – even to providing the Free Syria Army with bases and training facilities.The influx of Iranian arms supplies via Turkey gave the Syrian army a major boost in quelling the uprising especially in the restive towns of Hama, Homs and Idlib, where demonstrations have dwindled. Now Ankara is worried about the consequences. Thursday, President Abdullah Gul raised fears of the Syrian uprising mutating into civil war. Our sources report that Ankara is concerned that sectarian conflict in Syria could spill over into Turkey.In fact, as debkafile’s military and intelligence sources report exclusively, Ankara changed course against Iran after Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu visited Tehran on Jan. 5. His mission was to warn Iranian leaders including President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad whom he met that Turkey will not stand for Iran acquiring a nuclear bomb and would act to disrupt its program.Although his visit was officially presented as an effort to broker the resumption of long-stalled nuclear talks between Tehran and the five world powers plus Germany (P5+1), Davutoglu in fact informed Ahmadinejad in no-nonsense terms, “Turkey can't live between two nuclear powers, one to the north (Russia) and one to the east (Iran)." The minister warned that if Tehran goes into production of a nuclear weapon, Ankara's first step would be to open the door for NATO forces to deploy along its border with Iran.Read the full story here.

• Clinton says no deal yet for Taliban office in Qatar.(Alarabiya).U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Wednesday that Afghan and Taliban statements show there is support for a Taliban political office in Qatar, but said nothing has been concluded yet.“Positive statements” from Afghan President Hamid Karzai and the Taliban demonstrate “there is support for such discussions, for the (Taliban) political office to open in Qatar,” Clinton said.“Nothing has been concluded. We are still in the preliminary stages of testing whether this can be successful,” Clinton said in a press conference with Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim al-Thani.The Taliban announced last week that it planned to set up a political office in Qatar, a move seen as a precursor to peace talks with Washington.At the same time, the hardline Islamists demanded the release of prisoners from the U.S. military detention center at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.Clinton said: “We have not made any decisions about releasing any Taliban from Guantanamo.”Clinton said Washington backs Afghan-led reconciliation talks.She added that reconciliation can only occur if the Taliban renounces violence, breaks with Al-Qaeda and support the Afghan constitution, which protects the rights of women and minorities. “I have made it clear to President Karzai that we will work with him, under his leadership,” she said. She said she has dispatched U.S. special regional envoy Marc Grossman to travel to Afghanistan next week to continue U.S. consultations with the Afghans and also to visit Qatar to continue “consultations” there.Hmmmm.......Oh look a herd of unicorns leaving Guantanamo.Read the full story here.

• Turkey: Not bound by US sanctions against Iran.(HurriyetDaily).Turkey, which imports oil and gas from Iran, says it is only bound by U.N. sanctions against its eastern neighbor, despite the U.S. campaign to sanction Iran further over its nuclear program.Foreign Ministry spokesman Selcuk Unal said Turkey would evaluate the content of the U.S. sanctions but it "does not feel it is bound by any other sanctions." Unal spoke during a weekly news conference, which followed a meeting between Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and Iran's parliamentary speaker, Ali Larijani.On Thursday, Japan pledged to buy less Iranian oil, boosting the U.S. campaign a day after China reacted coolly to the idea. Japan imports about 10 percent of its oil from Iran while Turkey imports about 30 percent from Iran.The sanctions aim to halt what Western governments say is Iran's effort to develop nuclear weapons. Iran, however, insists its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.The sanctions, targeting the oil industry, would bar financial institutions from the U.S. market if they do business with Iran's central bank.Iran has threatened to respond to sanctions by shutting the Strait of Hormuz, a transit route for a fifth of the world's oil.Hmmmm.....I presume they got the 'blessing' from Their 'buddy'?It's an election Year can't give the 'waiver' but just go ahead it's 'cool'?Read the full story here.

• Report: Iran warns of 'cross-border' assassination response.(JPost).Iran's response to the assassination of a nuclear scientist in Iran Wednesday will reach beyond borders and the region, a website aligned with the regime in Tehran quoted a senior security source as saying Thursday.Those who gave the order for the assassination, the source was quoted as saying, "will never feel safe," adding that Iran's will have a cross-border, cross-regional strategy to strike back.He said that Tehran has entered "a new era of intelligence operations against its enemies."A university professor and department head of a uranium enrichment facility was killed by a bomb placed on his car by a motorcyclist in Tehran on Wednesday, Iranian media reported, in an incident that looked similar to attacks on nuclear scientists in the city more than one year ago.Read the full story here.

• Operation Grand Slam Nears Completion in Europe: Complete, Total Meltdown of Financial System.(DougRoss).Mike Shedlock -- who has a damn good track record on macroeconomics over the past several years -- uses the following headline, which actually understates the problem.Europe’s $39 Trillion Pension Time Bomb Explodes in 2012...Even before the euro crisis, people were worried about Europe’s pension bomb.State-funded pension obligations in 19 of the European Union nations were about five times higher than their combined gross debt, according to a study commissioned by the European Central Bank. The countries in the report compiled by the Research Center for Generational Contracts at Freiburg University in 2009 had almost 30 trillion euros ($39.3 trillion) of projected obligations to their existing populations....Stable or falling birthrates, plus rising life expectancies, are adding to pressures, with the proportion of economic output devoted to spending on retirement benefits projected to rise by a quarter to 14 percent by 2060, according to the ECB report.Europe has the highest proportion of people aged over 60 of any region in the world, and that is forecast to rise to almost 35 percent by 2050 from 22 percent in 2009, according to a report from the United Nations. That compares with a global estimate of 22 percent by 2050, up from 11 percent in 2009....In so-called developed countries, the average lifespan will reach almost 83 by 2050, up from about 75 in 2009, the UN said....State pension obligations in France and Germany are three times the size of their economies, according to data compiled by Mercer.
  Shedlock concludes: "The punchline to this economic disaster came in the middle of the article: 'Pension managers and governments are relying on economic growth to safeguard the promises they make.'"Suffice it to say that Europe will be lucky to average any growth -- even one percent -- over the next five years given its imminent set of cascading defaults.And, not to belabor the point, but this should serve as yet another alarm klaxon for any American concerned with the future of this Republic. That, of course, leaves out liberals, progressives and the rest of the Democrat Party, which appears bent on national suicide.Read and see the full story here.
  
  

• Turkish academics sign declaration in protest of new filters.(DL).Last week, we reported on the biases present in Turkey's new opt-in filtering system. Now, a group of fifteen Turkish academics have penned a declaration protesting the system, declaring the filter as "arbitrary, state-run, centralized censorship." The statement also alleged that the filter was limiting freedom of expression and is "being imposed across society."Comparing Turkey's system to those administered by China, Iran, and Saudi Arabia, the campaigners also note that Turkey is the only OSCE member state applying a centralized filtering system.As we've stated previously, filtering is costly, easy to circumvent, and often overbroad. In light of Turkey's history as a pervasive censor of the Internet, we continue to have grave concerns about the trajectory of this new filtering scheme.Read the full story here.

• Norwegian police investigating Breivik’s self-admitted links to Belarus, possible paramilitary training, mystery girlfriend.(OUTIW).Six months after Norwegian neo-fascist Anders Breivik, by his own admission, killed nearly 80 countrymen, including passersby near the prime minister’s office (pictured above) and teenagers at a ruling party camp, police in that country acknowledge that they are investigating the killer’s links to the “former” Soviet republic of Belarus. In a January 9 interview with the independent BelaPAN, Oslo police spokesman Roar Hansen said: “He admits to have been to Belarus, but he is not clear to the point if he has participated in military training in Belarus.”Bomber-gunman Breivik visited Belarus three times, Mikhail Rashetnikaw, leader of the unregistered Party of Patriots of Belarus, told Russia’s news website gazeta.ru on July 28, 2011, with reference to sources in “national state security and law-enforcement agencies,” meaning the Belarusian KGB. “In the spring of this year, during the active stage of preparations for the double terrorist attack, he visited Minsk and also trained in a closed military field camp,” Rashetnikaw told gazeta.ru. Breivik is rumored to have a girlfriend in Belarus, Rashetnikaw added.In his interview with BelaPAN, Hansen confirmed that Breivik, who is still awaiting trial on April 16, had been in a relationship with a Belarusian woman. “We know who she is,” he said. “We can not say more regarding that question.” Rashetnikaw told BelaPAN that a Norwegian prosecutor phoned him two weeks before and asked him about Breivik’s last trip to Belarus.Days after the July 22 bombing in Oslo and shooting spree on a nearby island, the Belarusian State Border Committee admitted that the Norwegian had stayed in Belarus for a week in March 2005 on a valid tourist visa. He arrived at the Minsk National Airport by a Vienna-Minsk plane on March 4 and left for the Austrian capital on March 11.Norway’s television channel NRK has recently confirmed that Breivik traveled to Belarus in 2005 to visit a woman whom he had met online. In Internet messages that she exchanged with Breivik, the Belarusian woman identified herself as “Natasha” or “Nadzya.”The Belarusian woman apparently visited Breivik in his homeland because a friend said that he had dined with Breivik and his Belarusian “girlfriend” in restaurants in Oslo several times. However, the couple’s relationship did not last long, with Breivik later telling friends that the woman had only wanted his money. According to NRK, the Belarusian now lives in the USA with her European husband.In view of the Soviet KGB’s historic and Russian SVR’s present use of female agents to entrap and manipulate foreigners, it is very possible that Breivik’s Belarusian girlfriend was in the employ of President Alexander Lukashenko’s secret police.Read the full story here.

• Articles from Urdu Magazine of Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU): '706 Jews of Banu Quraiza Tribe were Butchered on the Prophet's Order; Therefore, By Killing the Infidels We Must Give Testimony of Our Love to Allah and His Messenger'.(Memri).Recently, a jihadist internet forum released two issues of an Urdu-language magazine published by the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), a terrorist organization based in the Pakistani tribal region.The magazine is named Ghazwa-e-Hind (the Battle of India), a battle forecast in one of the sayings of Prophet Muhammad which is frequently quoted by jihadist organizations in Pakistan.  The two issues released are numbered 5 and 6, respectively for November and December 2011. The following are excerpts from two articles in the magazine's issue Number 5:

"It is the Duty of Muslims to Threaten the Enemies of Islam, and If These Enemies Call Our Mujahideen 'Terrorists' Then It is a Matter of Pride That They are Afraid of Our Lions"

Koran's Chapter Tauba Verse No. 123 Says: "O You Who Believe! Fight Against Those of the Infidels Who are Close to You and Let Them See Harshness in You..."

Prophet Muhammad Said: 'One Who Waged Jihad in the Path of Allah Even for a Period of Milking a Camel, Paradise Becomes Mandatorily Available to Him'

"Plunge into the Field of Jihad and Purchase Your Paradise; Allah Says: 'O Believers! Kill Among the Infidels Those Who are Near You'""Today, all prisons of the world are filled with our Muslim brothers and sisters. Have we done anything for their release? Would there be any answer from us before Allah on the Day of Judgment? Indeed, we have no answer. "Therefore, fear Allah and plunge into the field of jihad and purchase your paradise. Allah says [in the Koran]: 'O believers! Kill among the infidels those who are near you.' The fronts or camps of these defiled [Pakistani] troopers are so near to us [in the Pakistani tribal region] that we can break their heads by just throwing a stone, Allah willing."Apostates are the worst kind of infidels. Therefore, jihad against those apostates is extremely important and necessary. Imam Sarkhusi has written in his book, Mabsoot: 'These apostates are worst kind of infidels because they denied [Islam] after acceptance (Mabsoot Kitabus-Sayar, Majmaul-Anhar Sharha Multaqiul-Abhar, Ahkam-ul-Jihad)."Similarly, it is the fatwa [Islamic decree] by Ibn-e-Taymiyya that fighting against apostates is far better than fighting against the real infidels (Majma-ul-Fatawa)."O the self-respecting Muslims of Waziristan! A great jihad is underway in your area; please value this opportunity; vie with each other in supporting the immigrants [foreign jihadists] and in waging Jihad and in getting martyrdom. Indeed, Allah does not give this opportunity to all. May Allah grant us guidance to practice! Amen." Read the full story here.

• North Korea to punish ‘non-mourners’.(WSN).North Koreans who did not mourn the death of ‘Dear Leader’ Kim Jong-il can face at least six months in prison, a South Korean media outlet said Wednesday.And those who took part in the often hysterical display of sorrow but who may not have shed ‘genuine tears’ could be sent to re-education camps, the South Korean Daily NK website reported.The decision follows the completion of ‘criticism sessions’ at people’s courts across North Korea. Kim died in December aged 69, after 17 years as head of the country.North Korea’s state-run news agency KCNA, however, accused the Daily NK website of running a smear campaign. The website usually compiles reports from defectors and people living inside North Korea.KCNA also reported that Kim’s death was marked by plunging temperatures, mourning bears and flocks of magpies.Hmmmm.......Obama admin:"  Kim Jong-il smart and a quick problem-solver. … He is also witty and humorous. Read the full story here.