Coming to your neighborhood soon: "The Crisis in Pensions and Retirement Plans"

Source: Accounting-Degree.org

Is Obama a threat to Social Security?

Is Obama a threat to Social Security?(Examiner).If a Republican president said they wanted to reduce the deficit by cutting Social Security payments, it would be no surprise. But coming from a Democrat, it should be shocking.
In the past two years, President Obama has offered Social Security cuts to Republicans in budget negotiations at least twice. And even though they have not so far been included in any deals, President Obama continues to express a willingness cut Social Security by using a regressive chained consumer price index (CPI) formula to calculate cost of living adjustments.
The chained CPI uses the substitution of cheaper goods and services for COLA calculations that compound every year, so benefit reductions accelerate over time.
In practice, the longer someone receives benefits under chained CPI, the lower their payments. Therefore, the oldest Social Security recipients will end up getting the smallest checks.
For those who survive only on Social Security payments, which average around $1100 a month, chained CPI could be economically devastating.
Democrats in both the House and Senate have criticized President Obama for putting chained CPI Social Security cuts on the table. However, this is an area that the president has signaled he is ready to sacrifice to satisfy the Republican thirst for entitlement cuts.Hmmmm......They served their 'purpose' now they'll become expendable.the oldest Social Security recipients will end up getting the smallest checks.........'DeathPanels' anyone?Read the full story here.

Belgium leader in organ transplants from those Euthanized.

Belgium leader in organ transplants from those Euthanized.(TBAB).By Lisa Correnti. Deaths from “voluntary euthanasia” in Belgium are approximated at 2 percent, – 2,000 annually. At a recent conference in Brussels, a Belgian doctor reported that organ transplants are being done on euthanized patients and that Belgium leads in this practice.
Dr. Van Raemdonck reported that nine successful lung transplants from “voluntary euthanized” patients have been performed since 2007. Families of hospitalized patients in Belgium should take notice of this practice. In 2010 a study revealed that nurses in Belgium admitted to terminating patients without their consent. “The researchers found that a fifth of nurses admitted being involved in the assisted suicide of a patient. But nearly half of these - 120 of 248 - also said there was no consent.”
Although the authors of the study believed the nurses were acting according to their patients desires, they found the nurses “operated beyond the legal margins of their profession.Read the full story here.

The 'Pre-Existing Condition' Hoax in ObamaTax

The 'Pre-Existing Condition' Hoax in ObamaTax.(Breitbart).By Dr. Susan Berry.We are told that the ObamaTax will protect Americans with pre-existing conditions from nasty big health insurers, while Republicans and conservatives shrug their shoulders in “let them eat cake” fashion. Forget about the fact that the premise of the left’s presentation is totally false, as it often is, since big health insurers and hospitals are loving ObamaTax because it will channel federal funds right to their doorsteps. The truth is that, while a definite problem has prevailed for those with pre-existing medical conditions who have attempted to obtain health insurance coverage, that problem is small and manageable and can be adequately addressed with common-sense free market solutions. Most people, regardless of political ideology, want all Americans to be able to purchase health insurance coverage and gain access to care. The difference is not in the desire but in the policies that will get the job done. Neither Republicans nor Democrats have been successful in this endeavor to date. With ObamaTax, the left has chosen a big government policy that will offer a very brief period of health care access to individuals with pre-existing conditions, followed by little or no access to care as Americans cope with long lines to see doctors.
They will soon face an Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB), a group of unelected government bureaucrats, who, as their name says, will be more concerned with payment than health care. The “pre-existing condition” feature of ObamaTax is, indeed, a hoax, because it assumes that, once the law is fully implemented, those with pre-existing conditions will still be able to schedule an appointment with their doctors and specialists within a reasonable period of time. The law assumes this despite the fact that, at full implementation, all the currently uninsured will be added to the rolls as patients to the health care system. Members of Congress who pledge to repeal ObamaTax must also pledge to make sure our health care system is not ripe for government takeover again. Yes, everyone, even those with “pre-existing conditions” should be able to obtain health care coverage. What ObamaTax does not guarantee is health care access.Read the full story here.

The Elite Are Attempting To Convince Us That Killing Off The Elderly Is Good For America.

The Elite Are Attempting To Convince Us That Killing Off The Elderly Is Good For America.(AP).By Michael Snyder.
What should be done with elderly Americans when they become very seriously ill? Should we try to save their lives or should we just let them die? Unfortunately, there is a growing consensus among the "intellectual elite" that most elderly people are not going to have a high enough "quality of life" to justify the expense of costly life saving procedures.

This philosophy is now being promoted very heavily through mainstream news outlets, in our television shows and in big Hollywood movies. The elite are attempting to convince us that killing off our sick grandparents is cool and trendy.

We are being told that "pulling the plug" on grandma and grandpa is compassionate (because it will end their suffering), that it is good for the environment and that it is even good for the economy. We are being told that denying life saving treatments to old people will dramatically reduce health care costs and make the system better for all of us. We are being told that it is not "efficient" for health insurance companies to shell out $100,000 for an operation that may extend the life of an elderly person by 6 months.

But the truth is that all of this is part of a larger agenda that the elite are attempting to advance. As I have written about previously, the elite love death, and they truly believe that reducing the population is good for society and good for the planet. Sadly, population control propaganda has reached a fever pitch in recent months. Time Magazine has just come out with a very shocking cover story entitled "How To Die". The article goes on and on about how wonderful and compassionate it is to remove life-saving treatment from sick relatives.

A recent article by Mike Adams summarized the message of this disgusting article....

Inside, the magazine promotes a cost-saving death agenda that encourages readers to literally 'pull the feeding tubes' from their dying elderly parents, causing them to dehydrate and die. This is explained as a new cost-saving measure that drastically reduces return hospital visits by the elderly… yeah, because dead people don’t return to the hospital, of course.

Many of you also probably remember the Newsweek cover story from a couple years ago that was entitled "The Case for Killing Granny".

Underneath that shocking title was the following phrase: “Curbing excessive end-of-life care is good for America.”

According to the author of that article, spending less money on the elderly is the key to successful health care reform....

The idea that we might ration health care to seniors (or anyone else) is political anathema. Politicians do not dare breathe the R word, lest they be accused—however wrongly—of trying to pull the plug on Grandma. But the need to spend less money on the elderly at the end of life is the elephant in the room in the health-reform debate. Everyone sees it but no one wants to talk about it. At a more basic level, Americans are afraid not just of dying, but of talking and thinking about death. Until Americans learn to contemplate death as more than a scientific challenge to be overcome, our health-care system will remain unfixable.

Sadly, articles like that one are becoming quite frequent in mainstream media sources.

Just a few days ago, a Bloomberg article entitled "How 'Death Panels' Can Prolong Life" declared that we must "deny treatment to people who want it" in order to hold down costs....

In short, all the Republican talk during the health-care-reform debate about 'death panels' was melodramatic and unfair, but not ridiculous. One way or another, holding down health-care costs will require policies that deny treatment to people who want it. And want it because it will extend their lives.

This goes on already, all the time. Health insurance companies have been known to deny payment for treatments deemed unnecessary. Age limits for organ transplants are another example. All policies that involve denying care because of 'quality of life' considerations are, in effect, 'death panels.' But no society can afford to give every citizen every possible therapy. Medicare is going broke trying.

So who are we supposed to deny treatment to?


The elderly of course.

According to that Bloomberg article, we are supposed to kill off our sick grandparents because the "quality of life" they would be expected to have if they recover would not be enough to warrant spending so much to save them....

A $200,000 operation can add a year or two to the life of an octogenarian, or it can save decades of life for younger people. In a country like the U.S., with an average life expectancy of 78.5, it takes 10 septuagenarians who get an extra five years from the health-care system to balance a single 30-year-old who gets 50 extra years. Or save the life of a newborn, who then enjoys a normal life span and dies at 78.5, and you have the same impact on national life expectancy as 16 operations on septuagenarians. The average national life expectancy can increase even as the cost goes down.

This is the kind of thinking that starts happening in a society that dramatically devalues life.

If human life has little value, then it is easy to start justifying things that would have once been unthinkable.

For example, one surgeon is now suggesting that we should start harvesting organs from patients before they die....

Dr. Paul Morrissey, an associate professor of surgery at Brown University's Alpert Medical School, wrote in The American Journal of Bioethics that the protocol known as donation after cardiac death -- meaning death as a result of irreversible damage to the cardiovascular system -- has increased the number of organs available for transplant, but has a number of limitations, including the need to wait until the heart stops.

Because of the waiting time, Morrissey said that about one-third of potential donors end up not being able to donate, and many organs turn out to not be viable as a result.

Instead, he argues in favor of procuring kidneys from patients with severe irreversible brain injury whose families consent to kidney removal before their cardiac and respiratory systems stop functioning.

Do you want your organs harvested before you are dead?

Sadly, those that often do need organ transplants the most these days are often denied for "quality of life" issues as well.

For example, at one U.S. hospital a 3-year-old girl named Amelia was denied a kidney transplant that she desperately needed simply because she is considered to be "mentally retarded".

These are the kinds of decisions that are being made by doctors and by health insurance companies all over America every day.

And did you know that life-ending drugs are going to be 100% free under Obamacare?

I did not know this until I read a Christian Post article the other day....

A Christian-based legal defense alliance is warning Americans who already believe that President Barack Obama's health care plan is a bad idea that the 'ObamaCare mandate is worse than you think.'

'Everyone likes a good surprise, but no one likes a bad surprise. So, you're really not going to like the surprises buried in the 2,700 pages of this document,' says the narrator of a short video produced by the Alliance Defense Fund.

Did you know that with ObamaCare you will have to pay for life-saving drugs, but life-ending drugs are free. One hundred percent free. If this plan were really about health care wouldn't it be the other way around?'

Apparently they want to make it as easy to off yourself and your relatives as possible.

So where is all of this headed?

Are we eventually going to become like the Netherlands?

In the Netherlands, mobile euthanasia teams are now going door to door to help elderly patients end their lives in the comfort of their own homes.

Is that what we want? Do we want government agents going door to door to help people die? 

As I have written about previously, the elite believe that the world is massively overpopulated and they believe that all of us are ruining their planet.

So they love euthanasia, abortion and pretty much anything else that will result in more people ending up dead.Hmmmm................"DEATH PANELS"? Read the full story here.

Hmmmm......."l'histoire se répète" Nazi Persecution of the Disabled: Murder of “The Unfit”

Video: Obama Says Giving Medical Care To Old People, that costs a lot and maybe we will have to say, just take a pill. Priceless.

MFS - The Other News

                       Morning Posting.

• Live broadcast info from Japan directly ! Here.

• Libya Live Blog - April 17. Here .(Al-Jazeera).
• Updated !Earthquakes in the last 24 hours in the world low seismic activity in Japan  today between 4.7 and 4.9! More info here.

• Japan - Latest official Situation Update No. 89.On 17.04.2011 at 04:13 GMT+2
  
  Radiation levels around Japan’s stricken nuclear plant soared after another earthquake jolted the ­country yesterday. Engineers fear the 5.9 quake may have caused fresh leaks at ­Fukushima Dai-ichi, north of Tokyo. Levels of radioactivity rose sharply in seawater near the plant. It happened shortly after the Tokyo Electric Power Company had beefed up safety ­systems. TEPCO has been fighting leaks at the plant since it was crippled by a tsunami on March 11. Politicians – reportedly considering breaking up the ­company – think the ­problems will get worse. A government adviser said yesterday: “We are far from the end. There will be mountains to climb.”
  
  Situation Update No. 88 - On 16.04.2011 at 20:36 GMT+2
  
  Radiation levels have spiked again in seawater near the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in northern Japan in an indication of possible new leaks at the complex, the government said Saturday, According to reports. Workers have been trying to contain contaminated runoff at the plant that came with efforts to cool reactors and spent fuel rods after the devastating March 11 earthquake and tsunami knocked out primary and backup cooling systems for the plant’s six nuclear reactors. Tokyo Electric Power Co. Inc. the operator of the plant, recently found and eventually plugged a leak that might have been spewing for days. Levels of radioactive materials in the ocean near the site fell afterward. But the government said Saturday those radioactive levels in the seawater rose again in recent days, and may have been caused by the installation of steel panels meant to control radioactive materials. Plant workers on Saturday dumped sandbags filled with a mineral that absorbs radioactive cesium into the ocean as the effort to find and contain the leak continued, the wire service said.Source : Here .

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

• HT:IsraelMatzav.Breaking: Two 18-year old 'Palestinians' arrested for Fogel family massacre .I'm sure you'll all be shocked - just shocked - to hear that two 'Palestinians' have been arrested for the murders of five members of the Fogel family of Itamar.Headline: Two 18-year-old terrorists arrested. They admit to the murder of the Fogel Family in Itamar.Amjed Awad and Hakim Awad, relatives, re-enacted the murder and confessed during their interrogation.I wonder if some of those who implicated Thai workers in the attack will now retract.Why would two 18-year olds commit such brutal murders? Hint: The original Oslo accords were signed 18 years ago this coming September. These kids imbibed Jew hatred with their mother's milk and watched it on 'Palestinian' television long after they finished nursing. They represent a new generation of 'Palestinians' that hates Jews far more fiercely even than its elders. They have been raised on hatred.The two cousins - aged 'around 18' and 'nearly 19' - are charged with the murder. They are from the neighboring village of Awarta. Six other 'Palestinians' were arrested, including an uncle Salah who helped them to hide the murder weapons and guns stolen from Itamar, and to burn their clothes. The uncle gave the weapons to a 'Palestinian' from Ramallah, who was arrested on April 14. The weapons were found in his home. Seven of the eight 'Palestinians' arrested are related.The two reconstructed the murder. They jumped the fence into Itamar, broke into an empty house, and stole an M-16 rifle, bullets and a bulletproof vest. Then they broke into the Fogel house, where they murdered the 11-year old Yoav and 4-year old Elad. Then they went into the parents' room where they fought with and murdered the parents. They apparently shot Ruti Fogel with the rifle.Then they left the house, debated whether to return to look for weapons, returned, heard the baby crying and murdered her. They did not see the other children - they said they would have murdered them too had they seen them. They then stole an M-16 from the Fogel house as well.They are affiliated with the 'Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.'Their motivation was terror for the sake of terror. None of the terror organizations were apparently involved. All Israelis and Jews were their targets, and they came to murder - and for no other reason.It took a long time for the two murderers to confess.Hmmmm......To prevent a 'repeat' perhaps Impose a no man's land of 2 miles ,anyone crossing it will be shot on sight.Read the full story here.

• Rep. Scalise says Obama violates Constitution over 'czars'.(TheHill)Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.), the chief sponsor of the effort to defund administration-appointed advisers known as "czars," reacted angrily Saturday to a signing statement from Obama saying he plans to keep them. In a statement emailed to The Hill, Scalise accused Obama of acting like a “dictator.”"President Obama should know that it is the courts, not the executive branch, that has the authority to determine the constitutionality of laws passed by Congress, especially considering that he agreed to this provision and signed the law himself," Scalise said in an emailed statement."The President does not have the option of choosing which laws he will follow and which he will ignore,” he continued.Scalise said that Obama's backtracking on the czar issue will make future talks on spending and the budget more difficult.“The president knew that the czar amendment was part of the overall budget deal he agreed to, and if he cannot be trusted to keep his word on this, then how can he be trusted as we negotiate on larger issues like federal spending and the economy,” he said.“A bipartisan coalition in Congress agreed that President Obama was circumventing the constitution by appointing these czars without the scrutiny of Senate confirmation. The United States is not a kingdom run by a political dictator, and President Obama needs to quickly reverse course and abide by the law eliminating the czars that were part of the budget resolution agreed to by Speaker Boehner, Senator Reid, and President Obama himself,” Scalise continued.Scalise was the sponsor of HR 59, the Sunset All Czars act which had 53 cosponsors."It's not surprising that the White House, having bypassed Congress to empower these 'Czars' is objecting to eliminating them," Michael Steel, spokesman for Boehner said.The spending bill signed by Obama on Friday contained a provision defunding four administartion advisers knowns as the healthcare, auto, clmate change and urban affairs czars.Hmmmm........When you look at History one can only observe that all these 'Csars' were totalitarian and in the end it resulted in Revolution perhaps there's a warning there for Congress?Read the full story here.

• HT:IsraelMatzav.Whitewashing Obama's UN. President Obama's UN Ambassador Susan Rice took time off from the Washington party circuit last week to appear before the House Foreign Affairs Committee and before a subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee. Rice was there to defend the Obama administration's policy of 'engagement,' and to show off the administration's 'accomplishments' at the UN. Anne Bayefsky rips Rice's testimony to shreds, and I urge you all to read the whole thing. But I want to highlight for you how this evil administration in Washington (yes, Bacci40, they are evil) is selling Israel down the river.The biggest “engagement” sham of all was her excuse for throwing Israel to the U.N. wolf pack. In Rice’s words: “The results there [at the Human Rights Council] were worse when America sat on the sidelines. . . . Israel was relentlessly bashed. . . . U.S. engagement and leadership are paying dividends.” In fact, at its March session with the Obama administration squarely in the middle of it all, the Council adopted more resolutions bashing Israel than at any other session in its history.

Rice’s written submission contained a section called “singling out Israel” that was intended to be about the U.N., rather than the Obama administration. But she herself said the following: “Israeli settlement activity is illegitimate, undermines Israel’s security, and corrodes hopes for peace and stability in the region.”This inflammatory statement comes just a few weeks after Palestinian terrorists decapitated a three-month old Jewish baby (and murdered four other members of her family) for the crime of existing on a plot of land whose legal ownership is undecided and subject to negotiation. Until President Obama came into office, a rule prohibiting Jews from living on any Palestinian-claimed land was not American policy. But after Obama’s 2010 General Assembly speech naming an artificial 2011 deadline for the creation of a Palestinian state, Palestinians have been emboldened to use the U.N. to make apartheid-Palestine a fait accompli.It is time for someone, whether it be members of Congress or a Republican presidential contender, to save America from President Obama’s U.N.Hmmmm.....It seems Israel has nothing to fear but the Obama regime.Read the full story here.

• Helen Thomas to address anti-Israel protests during Netanyahu's visit to U.S.A series of anti-Israel protests, lectures and meetings are scheduled to coincide with the PM's visit and the AIPAC conference in Washington DC in May. BDS founder meets Friday night with 250 activists calling Israel apartheid state.WASHINGTON - A series of protests against Israeli policy and its support by AIPAC are planned in May to coincide with the AIPAC conference in the U.S. capital and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's speech there. The protests, under the heading "Move over AIPAC," will include demonstrations opposite the building where Netanyahu will speak and Congress, and a series of lectures and meetings with critics of Israel, including veteran journalist Helen Thomas who lost her place in the White House press room after saying Jews should leave Palestine and go back to Poland, Germany and the United States. Thomas will give the keynote address at the Move Over AIPAC conference, and will receive an award from the women's pacifist organization Code Pink, one of the hundred left-wing American organizations behind the conference.The evening began with a moment of silence for actor Juliano Mer-Khamis, murdered earlier this month in Jenin, and Italian journalist Vittorio Arrigoni, murdered in recent days in Gaza. Barghouti then quoted U.S. President Barack Obama's justification for the NATO attacks on Muammar Gadhafi's forces in Libya. "Innocent people were targeted for killing. Hospitals and ambulances were attacked. Supplies of food and fuel were choked off. Water for hundreds of thousands of people was shut off. Cities and towns were shelled, mosques were destroyed and apartment buildings reduced to rubble," Barghouti said, reading out a statement. "This is about Libya, but you would say the same logic should be applied to Gaza. Unfortunately, it is not. Revolutions are shaking the Middle East, and one big loser is Israel. As Arab governments become more democratic they will reflect peoples' opinions, which are very much opposed to the Israeli apartheid." On Friday night, a favorite cafe among progressives, Busboys and Poets, gathered letters to Gazans; the next aid flotilla in May will deliver the messages to the Gaza residents. A separate room in the cafe hosted a meeting of around 250 activists with Omar Barghouti, founder of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign. Barghouti, who recently released a book on BDS, was winding up a book tour that included Columbia, Harvard, Brandeis and other universities.Hmmmm....One happy Jew haters gathering ,i wonder why Hussein wasn't there to see and hear his favorite journalist?Read the full story here.

• Top GOP House Congresswoman Says if Palestinians Use UN to Declare Statehood US Aid to Both Could Be Cut.Via.JP.Kay Granger tells ‘Post’ that Israel’s aid should not be singled out, unilateral declaration of 'Palestine' will affect US aid to PA and UN.WASHINGTON – A top congresswoman is warning that the US could reduce aid to the Palestinians if they pursue a unilateral declaration of statehood at the UN.“That would be a very, very bad thing to do,” Rep. Kay Granger, chairwoman of the House appropriations subcommittee overseeing foreign aid, told The Jerusalem Post. (The interview will appear in Monday’s Pessah supplement.) “It will” affect US aid to the Palestinian Authority, the Texas Republican said, adding, “It would be a very serious step. It also could affect our funding at the UN.”For the time being, however, she said that she supports aid for the Palestinians and sees the US continuing to contribute hundreds of millions in dollars for Palestinian security despite the GOP zeal for reducing spending.“We believed that was important, and I continue to believe that’s important,” she said. “I’ve been there and seen some of the security that’s occurring that we’re helping to fund. And I think overall it’s a help – it’s a help toward reaching a peace, if we can do that.”Granger also told the Post that she and other Republicans remained committed to aid for Israel, which totals nearly $3 billion in annual assistance.“The friendship and assistance is solid from the Congress, both the House andSenate and both Democrats and Republicans,” she said.Hmmmm.....I've got news for you have a 'President' who doesn't recognise the authority of Congress ,time to wake up Mrs.Chairwoman.Read the full story here.

• "Police state" brutality?TSA security looks at people who complain about ... TSA security.(CNN.)Don't like the way airport screeners are doing their job? You might not want to complain too much while standing in line.Arrogant complaining about airport security is one indicator Transportation Security Administration officers consider when looking for possible criminals and terrorists, CNN has learned exclusively. And, when combined with other behavioral indicators, it could result in a traveler facing additional scrutiny.CNN has obtained a list of roughly 70 "behavioral indicators" that TSA behavior detection officers use to identify potentially "high risk" passengers at the nation's airports.Many of the indicators, as characterized in open government reports, are behaviors and appearances that may be indicative of stress, fear or deception. None of them, as the TSA has long said, refer to or suggest race, religion or ethnicity.But one addresses passengers' attitudes towards security, and how they express those attitudes.It reads: "Very arrogant and expresses contempt against airport passenger procedures."TSA officials declined to comment on the list of indicators, but said that no single indicator, taken by itself, is ever used to identify travelers as potentially high-risk passengers. Travelers must exhibit several indicators before behavior detection officers steer them to more thorough screening.But a civil liberties organization said the list should not include behavior relating to the expression of opinions, even arrogant expressions of opinion."Expressing your contempt about airport procedures -- that's a First Amendment-protected right," said Michael German, a former FBI agent who now works as legal counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union. "We all have the right to express our views, and particularly in a situation where the government is demanding the ability to search you.""It's circular reasoning where, you know, I'm going to ask someone to surrender their rights; if they refuse, that's evidence that I need to take their rights away from them. And it's simply inappropriate," he said.The TSA says its security programs are informed by real-world situations and intelligence. Indeed, the immigration agent who refused to let the alleged "20th hijacker" into the United States in 2001 later testified that the man's arrogant behavior contributed to his suspicions.Hmmmm....."Arrogant Behaviour" does that count also in cases towards Congress?Read the full story here.

• Donor states to 'Palestinians' condemn provocative flotillas to Gaza.The donor states to the Palestinian Authority, which held a conference last week in Brussels, condemned in its concluding statement uncoordinated aid flotillas to Gaza. The conference called on all parties to use land terminals to the Strip and avoid provocations. The statement is signed by the chairman of the conference, Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Store. A major force behind the clause was intense lobbying from the Israeli delegation to the conference, comprised of the coordinator of government activities in the territories, Maj. Gen. Eitan Dangot, and Foreign Ministry diplomats. The government and the defense establishment are both concerned about the large aid flotilla that leftist and Muslim organizations plan for late May, marking a year since the Israel Defense Forces raid on the Turkish ship the Mavi Marmara, which ended in the death of nine activists.The conference statement praised Israel for easing the process of allowing goods into Gaza, but said more steps needed to be taken before the economic situation in the Strip improves. It also voiced deep concern over the recent escalation in the south. A senior defense official told Haaretz he was pleased with the statement, saying that it was important for Israel to hear across the board opposition to provocative flotillas to Gaza, praise for Israel's financial initiatives and emphasis on avoiding hurting civilians during conflict.Read the full story here.

• Column One: Turkey’s cautionary tale.(JPost).HT:CarolineGlick.Turkey's AKP used democracy to gain power. Now that they have power, they are systematically destroying freedom in their country.Unfortunately, nine years into the AKP’s “democratic” regime it is clear that Erdogan and his colleagues’ embrace of the language and tools of democracy was a mile wide and an inch thick. They used democracy to gain power. Now that they have power, they are systematically destroying freedom in their country.Turkey ranks 138th in the international media freedom group Reporters Sans Frontieres country index on press freedom. Sixty-eight journalists are languishing in Turkish jails for the crime of doing their job. The most recent round-up of reporters occurred in early March. And it is demonstrative of Turkey’s Islamist leaders’ exploitation of democratic freedoms in the service of their tyrannical ends.As Der Spiegel reported last week, veteran journalists Ahmet Sik from the far-left Radikal newspaper and Nedim Sener from the highbrow Milliyet journal were among those rounded up. As radical leftists, both men oppose the AKP’s Islamist politics. But they shared its interest in weakening the Turkish military.The Left opposed the military’s constitutional role as the overseer of Turkish democracy because the military used that role to persecute leftists. The AKP party opposed the military’s power because it blocked the party’s path to Islamizing Turkish society and politics. When the AKP turned its guns on the military it used leftist journalists to support its actions.TURKEY’S DESCENT into Islamist tyranny has not simply destroyed freedom in Turkey. It has transformed Turkey’s strategic posture in a manner that is disastrous for the West. And yet, in this arena as well, the West refuses to notice what is happening.Earlier this week the US Ambassador to Ankara Francis Ricciardone gave an interview to the Turkish media in which he romantically upheld the US-Turkish partnership. As he put it, “Our interests are similar. Even if we have different methods and targets, our strategic vision is the same.”Sadly, there is no way to square this declaration with Turkish policy.This week it was reported that NATO member Turkey is opening something akin to a Taliban diplomatic mission in Ankara. Turkey supports Hamas and Hizbullah. It has begun training the Syrian military. It supports Iran’s nuclear weapons program. It has become the Iranian regime’s economic lifeline by allowing the mullahs to use Turkish markets to bypass the UN sanctions regime.In less than 10 years, the AKP regime has dismantled Turkey’s strategic alliance with Israel. It has inculcated the formerly tolerant if not pro- Israel Turkish public with virulent anti-Semitism. It is this systematic indoctrination to Jew-hatred that has emboldened Turkish leaders to announce publicly that they support going to war against Israel.The Turkish government stands behind the al- Qaida- and Hamas- linked IHH group. IHH organized last year’s pro-Hamas flotilla to Gaza in which IHH members brutally attacked IDF naval commandoes engaged in a lawful mission to maintain Israel’s lawful maritime blockade of Gaza’s coast. With the support of the Turkish government, IHH is now planning an even larger flotilla to assault Israel’s blockade of Gaza next month.Actually, in a sign of the intimacy of its ties to the AKP regime, this week IHH announced it is considering postponing the next pro-Hamas flotilla in order to ensure that its illegal pro-terror campaign will not harm the AKP’s electoral prospects in Turkey’s national elections scheduled for June.American and other Western officials have argued that it would be wrong to distance their governments from Turkey or in any way censure the NATO member because doing so will only strengthen the anti-Western forces in the anti- Western government. Instead, Western leaders have done everything they can to appease Erdogan.The US even allowed him to invade Iraqi Kurdistan.Unfortunately, this appeasement policy has only harmed the West and NATO. Take the behavior of NATO’s Secretary-General and former Danish prime minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen. As Denmark’s prime minister, Rasmussen stood up boldly to the Islamists when they demanded that he apologize for the Danish newspaper Jyllands Posten’s publication of caricatures of Muhammad in 2005. Yet when Turkey threatened to veto his appointment as NATO secretary-general in 2009 over the Islamists’ rejection of free speech, Rasmussen abandoned his strong defense of Western liberal values to placate the Turks.In a humiliating speech Rasmussen said, “I was deeply distressed that the cartoons were seen by many Muslims as an attempt by Denmark to mark or insult or behave disrespectfully towards Islam or the Prophet Muhammad... I respect Islam as one of the world’s major religions as well as its religious symbols.”Rasmussen then proceeded to appoint Turks to key positions in the alliance.Far from reining in Turkey’s anti-Western policies, by maintaining Turkey in NATO Western powers have been forced to curtail their own defense of their interests.Professional laziness stands at the root of the West’s decision not to contend with the unpleasant truth that the AKP is an Islamist party whose basic ideology has more in common with Osama bin Laden’s values than with George Washington’s. This truth was always available. Erdogan and his colleagues did not make any special efforts to hide what they stand for.The West chose not to pay attention because its senior officials knew if they did, they would have to do something. They would have had to distance themselves from Turkey, remove Turkey from NATO and seek to contain the power of the Erdogan regime. And this would have been hard and unpleasant.But while this strategy has been convenient for policymakers, it has done great damage to their countries. The growing menace that is Islamist Turkey teaches us that professional laziness and cultural squeamishness are recipes for strategic disasters.Hmmmm.....Obama's best friend Erdogan,As i said many times before "GET TURKEY OUT OF NATO"!And keep them out of the European Union.Read the full story here.

• HT:TeaAndPolitics.Burqa ban: Erdogan condemns France.Council of Europe in Strasbourg, April 13, 2011/Vincent Kessler)Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan accused France of violating the freedom of religion on Wednesday after Paris began enforcing a law barring Muslim women from wearing full face veils in public. He told the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe that Turkey was the only Muslim country that had copied the French law on secularism, or separating church and state.“It’s quite ironic to see that secularism is today under debate in Europe and is undermining certain freedoms,” he said. “Today in France, there is no respect for individual religious freedom,” he said. The Strasbourg-based Council of Europe monitors human rights across the continent.Absolutely stunning for a country that considers that other religions threaten Turkey:

Although missionary work is legal in secular Turkey, the mistrust of missionaries has been expressed by state institutions. In 2001, a report prepared for Turkey’s National Security Council, which brings together generals, politicians and the president, said missionary activities constituted a threat to national unity as their ultimate aim was to “divide Turkey”.“Missionary activity, the prime threat to Turkey, has nothing to do with freedom of religion,” Namik Kemal Zeybek, leader of the Democrat Party, or DP, a small right-wing group, said in a speech last week, according to press reports. “These missionary activities, called ‘Evangelical’ and supported by US dollars, are a threat for the whole of humanity.”Hmmmm.....'Imam" Erdogan “The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers…” Read the full story here.

• Iran to launch ‘halal’ Internet: report.Iran has announced it would launch an Islamic Internet to counter the influence of the US dominated world wide web. “Iran will soon create an Internet that conforms to Islamic principles, to improve its communication and trade links with the world,” Ali Aqamohammadi, head of economic affairs with the Iranian presidency, told state news agency IRNA.Aqamohammadi said Iran’s new network will operate parallel to the world wide web and will replace it in Muslim countries in the region.“We can describe it as a genuinely ‘halal’ network aimed at Muslims on an ethical and moral level.”“The aim of this network is to increase Iran and the Farsi language’s presence in what has become the most important source of international communication,” Aqamohammadi said.Source .

• HT:WestForTheWestWing.A death panel by any other name is still a death panel.While everyone else was focused on Barack Obama bashing Paul Ryan, I noticed that he took full ownership of death panels yesterday [in his speech on the budget]. Naturally, Obama did not call them death panels. He called them “an independent commission of doctors, nurses, medical experts and consumers.” But his description hits dead on with what his death panels will do.According to Barack Obama yesterday, the death panels “will look at all the evidence and recommend the best ways to reduce unnecessary spending while protecting access to the services seniors need.”We already know what they’ll recommend as “the best ways to reduce unnecessary spending”. Barack Obama’s own advisers have told us. They will prioritize giving health care to healthier people and let sicker people die. At end of life, they will deny people life sustaining treatment because, after all, they’re going to die anyway. Note his phrasing: “protecting access to the services seniors need.” Dying people, according to Obama’s advisers, need hospice not hope. They certainly do not need expensive treatments that may buy them time to see the birth of a new grandchild or other reasons.“We will change the way we pay for health care – not by procedure or the number of days spent in a hospital, but with new incentives for doctors and hospitals to prevent injuries and improve results. . . . If we’re wrong, and Medicare costs rise faster than we expect, this approach will give the independent commission the authority to make additional savings by further improving Medicare,” Obama said. At a time Democrats are saying Republicans want to starve old people to death, Democrats are intent on embracing a cost savings model for Medicare that incentivizes doctors to encourage people to die and, when all else fails, gives a death panel “the authority to make additional savings by” ensuring the dying elderly die quickly.“Our approach lowers the government’s health care bills by reducing the cost of health care itself,” Obama said. Really? The only way that will happen is by rationing. You may not like the use of the phrase “death panel,” but make no mistake about it — at the end of your life, in Barack Obama’s America, his death panel will throw you under the bus in a way much closer to reality than metaphor.Can anyone say they’re surprised? Obama is, after all, a man who eagerly throws newborn babies under the bus. The man is pitiless. But unbelievably — even for him — he had the damn gall to accuse Republicans of leaving Down syndrome children out in the cold! Barack Obama prefers to leave them in hospital dirty-linen closets to die of exposure, suffocation and dehydration. Obama’s “Science Czar,” John Holdren, would have every one of those babies killed, if he had his way, along with millions of other “surplus” babies who are cluttering up the planet — even if the government has to force women to have abortions against their will, as in China.But again, who’s surprised? Obama and his closest buddies — Bill Ayers, Van Jones, Anita Dunn — are all admirers of Mao Tse-Tung, who killed 40,000,000 human beings. Life is cheap with this crowd.In the words of the Manhattan Declaration of Christian Conscience (which I have signed, and I hope you have, too), “Because the sanctity of human life, the dignity of marriage as a union of husband and wife, and the freedom of conscience and religion are foundational principles of justice and the common good,… We pledge to each other, and to our fellow believers, that no power on earth, be it cultural or political, will intimidate us into silence or acquiescence.”Hmmmm......How long before the 'Non existent Fema Camps' will be filled with the true patriots of America?Read the full story here.

• HT:TheAstuteBloggers.Why and when did Obama really gain his connection to Chicago and the Chicago Machine?A MUST READ STORY ! Read the full story here.

• HT:AmnonAndJonathan.Vittorio's mother will be sailing to Gaza.Gaza - PNN – Agidea Prata, the mother of Vittorio Arrigoni, the Italian activist and journalist killed in Gaza on Friday, said that she will be sailing to Gaza on May with the Free Gaza flotilla. Prata on Saturday told Italian news sources that “I want to see the Gaza that my son loved and sacrificed for, I want to meet the good people living there that my son Vik always talked about”. She added that Vittorio's work will go on though his friends. Vittorio’s mother added that her son received death threats from a right wing American group on their website two years ago because of his photos published online and the pro Palestinian tattoo he has on his shoulder.Vittorio first came to Gaza with the Free Gaza folitial in 2008 and used to live in a single bedroom house near Gaza City coastline until he was kidnapped and murdered by armed men.Also on Saturday organizers of the Free Gaza flotilla announced that next voyage to Gaza will be named “ Freedom Flotilla – Stay Human” in Honor of Vittorio Arrigoni.“The murder of human rights activist, Vittorio Arrigoni, is a tragedy for his family, for those of us who knew him, and for the Palestinians who loved and admired him. The Steering Committee of Freedom Flotilla 2 condemns this senseless murder and the people who are behind it. They took the life of one of the most passionate supporters of justice for Palestine. This murder is damaging to the Palestinian struggle for freedom and justice as well as our work in support of that struggle.” The group said on their website. Adding that ““Stay Human he would say, then grin and clench his pipe in his teeth. We will do our best, Vik to carry on the work you have done. The flotilla will return to Gaza in your honor.” According to the Free Gaza Movement the group will send a new flotilla to Gaza on May. Last year on May 30th Israeli navy attacked the freedom flotilla boats while sailing in international water to Gaza killing 9 aid workers and injuring 54.Hmmmm......As i said already yesterday sacrificed for the greater good of the cause.Stay INhuman.Read the full story here.