Video - End Times Today Series Lesson 1: Mahdi vs. Antichrist.

HT: Shoebat. Read the full story here.

Iranian Spiritual Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei: "Prepare For Environment That Will Bring Mahdi/End Times."

Iranian Spiritual Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei: "Prepare For Environment That Will Bring Mahdi/End Times."(TT).By Brad Macdonald.Tension is rising in the Middle East again. The civil war in Syria is worsening, Western sanctions on Iran are intensifying, large-scale military exercises by both Tehran and the West are on the cards. This is all worrying and cause for alarm. Yet, it is an unprecedented, largely ignored national address by Iran’s supreme leader that is most alarming. On Friday July 6, a number of Iranian state-run media outlets ran stories highlighting remarks by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
In his address, Khamenei warned his people all over the world that Iran must prepare for war, and that we are now living in “the end of times.” 
More specifically, Khamenei warned of the imminent return of the Mahdi, or the 12th imam. “The issue of Imam Mahdi is of utmost importance, and his reappearance has been clearly stated in our holy religion of Islam,” he said.

 “We must study and remind ourselves of the end of times and Imam Mahdi’s era. … We must prepare the environment for the coming so that the great leader will come.”

The belief of a returning Mahdi, or 12th imam, is a defining doctrine within the most populous group of Shiites known as Ithna Ashari, or “Twelvers.” In addition to Iran’s supreme leader, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also belongs to this influential group.
According to Twelver theology, the Mahdi’s return will be precipitated by planet-engulfing wars, the likes of which will destroy one third of the world’s population, and another third as a result of widespread hunger, disease and social unrest. Finally, the destruction will be capped with the annihilation of the Jewish state and the killing of all infidels, after which the seed of Islam will be planted in the four corners of the Earth. 
Here in the West, most people mistakenly ignore this theology and the depth of commitment Khamenei, Ahmadinejad and their followers have to it. This is to our own peril. Twelvers don’t just believe the Mahdi will soon return: They consider it a personal responsibility to create the apocalyptic conditions that will surround his return. Frankly, ushering in the Mahdi is the guiding principle of Iran’s foreign policy! 
As Joel Rosenburg, former aide to Benjamin Netanyahu, put it, “In order to bring about this Islamic messiah, the Mahdi, the 12th imam, Islamic leaders need to hasten his coming by destroying little Satan, Israel, and the great Satan, the United States. The leaders actually believe they need to create bloody carnage, the death of millions of people in order to create the conditions for the Mahdi to bring peace”.
Indeed, as Khamenei recently told his people: “We must prepare for the coming. Since we consider ourselves the warriors of the 12th imam, we must fight.” Khamenei has created several centers in Iran devoted to the research of the coming of the Mahdi, and there’s even an annual conference on Mahdiism. In 2004, during his tenure as mayor of Tehran, Ahmadinejad constructed a “grand avenue” in preparation for the Mahdi’s return. When he became president in 2005, he allocated $17 million for a blue-tiled mosque in Jamkaran (south of the capital), closely associated with mahdaviat. Inside Iran, both Khamenei and Ahmadinejad have been quite literally preparing the place to which they believe the Mahdi will return. Ahmadinejad’s conviction is so strong, he even stood in front of a room full of United Nations leaders in New York and prayed for Allah to help him hasten the Mahdi’s return—which he could only do by precipitating a holocaust-type event! Citing Iranian news media, the Journal of Turkish Weekly last week reported that the regime in Tehran is even distributing a booklet titled The Last Six Months. According to Reza Kahlili (a pseudonym for a former cia operative in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards), “the material admonishes the Revolutionary Guards and the Basij paramilitary forces that they must be prepared to do their duties during the expected war.” One can hardly overstate the influence of Twelver theology on Iranian national and foreign policy. “From redressing the gulf between rich and poor in Iran, to challenging the United States and Israel and enhancing Iran’s power with nuclear programs, every issue is designed to lay the foundation for the Mahdi’s return,” wrote Scott Peterson.
Amir Mohebian, political editor of the Islamic Resalat newspaper, noted the effect of Ahmadinejad’s religion on his leadership: “This kind of mentality makes you very strong. … If you think these are the last days of the world, and the Mahdi will come again, this idea will change all your relations.” Putting himself in Ahmadinejad’s shoes, Mohebian stated, “If I think the Mahdi will come in two, three or four years, why should I be soft? Now is the time to stand strong, to be hard.”
Here’s how Charles Krauthammer summed up Iran under Ahmadinejad not long after he was elected in 2005: “A Holocaust-denying, virulently anti-Semitic, aspiring genocidist, on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons of the apocalypse, believes that the end is not only near but nearer than the next American presidential election. … This kind of man would have, to put it gently, less inhibition about starting Armageddon than a normal person.” When you read these statements, you begin to grasp exactly what is at stake right now in the Middle East! Problem is, too few are paying any attention to these facts.Read the full story here.

Khamenei Has Blood on His Hands, Is Lying about Nukes, Says Former Revolutionary Guards General.

                                        Khomeini " There is no fun in Islam"


Khamenei Has Blood on His Hands, Is Lying about Nukes, Says Former Revolutionary Guards General.(Guardian).A former general of Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guards has accused the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, of having blood on his hands over the brutal crackdown on the opposition, and described government claims that its nuclear programme is entirely peaceful as a “sheer lie.” In a letter to prominent opposition activist Mohammad Nourizad (website in Farsi), the former officer gives a rare glimpse of political dissent within the ranks of the elite force in charge of the nuclear programme and Khamenei’s personal security. Identified only by his initials, the general says that he and a number of his colleagues were threatened with execution for disloyalty and then - after a series of secret courts-martial - dismissed “because we refused to participate in the betrayals and the crimes committed by our seniors”. “I’m writing this letter to you to tell our people that there are still many generals and members of staff within the Revolutionary Guards who are opposed to these crimes and are waiting to join the people,” the letter reads. Speaking to the Guardian by telephone from Tehran, Nourizad - who published the general’s letter on his website - said he was convinced of its authenticity because it was handed to him in person by the former general. “This is one of the many such letters written by senior figures within the Sepah [Revolutionary Guards] that I have received. I have refrained from publishing many of them because I was worried they might pose security problems,” said Nourizad. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards are an elite force separate from the Iranian army and under the direct command of the country’s supreme leader. The corps was founded to protect Iran’s revolutionary values, but has become increasingly involved in politics and business. In the aftermath of the fiercely disputed 2009 elections, several dozen Revolutionary Guards generals, as well as senior figures in the informal voluntary Basij militia, were replaced for refusing to use violence against unarmed protesters. According to the general, the order to open fire on the protesters came from the top. “[In 2009,] the leader [Khamenei] asked Rahim Safavi [a former chief commander of the guards] whether he would be prepared to run over people with tanks if they took to streets to revolt. He said yes and the leader gave him the order,” he writes. “They shut our mouth for years by saying that the leader wanted this or that … But we could no more keep it shut after the post-election bloodshed. This was the point many spoke out or simply refused to comply.” According to the general, Khamenei was also personally involved in the restrictions imposed on the opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi, who is still under house arrest with little access to the outside world. “How can a supreme leader with blood on his hands be close to God?,” he asks. The general also accuses Khamenei of lying about Iran’s nuclear programme, which is now subject to an international dispute, the general casts doubt on what the regime officials claim to be “peaceful” activities, describing them as the country’s “nuclear gamble”.
“The inspectors of the International Atomic Energy Agency are fooling themselves if they believe that the nuclear facilities on and under the ground are only for peaceful purposes,” he writes. “The leader said [in a fatwa] that Iran has only peaceful intentions with its nuclear activities. This is a sheer lie.” The general accuses the Revolutionary Guards of corruption and involvement in smuggling and the illegal transfer of foreign currency. “Is it not ridiculous? The presidential office established a unit to combat smuggling but at the same time, senior guards generals were doing exactly the same thing in the southern islands of Qeshm, Hormuz and Abu Musa,” he writes. “We tolerated the guards’ economic activities and involvement in smuggling with the excuse of raising funds for its revolutionary ideas.”Read the full story here.

MFS - The Other News

                        Afternoon Posting.

• Syria Live Blog - May 15. Here .(Al-Jazeera).

• Libya Live Blog - May 15. Here (Al-Jazeera).

• Updated !Earthquakes in the last 24 hours in the world seismic activity in Japan  today 4.7 activity. More info here.

• Japan - Latest official Situation Update No. 109.Source : Here .
• Japan : For the most accurate info on the nuclear disaster go to : Paul Langley's Nuclear History Blog.Here.

• Obama Goes Golfing For 7th Straight Week, 68th Round Since Taking Office.Why would this Scriptures quoting self confessed Christian President bother with the flooded Americans?Can a man be more hypocrite?Source.
• Related - Obama Golfs for the Seventh Weekend in a Row.(WhiteHouseDossier).President Obama is skipping church this morning to head to out to the golf course, playing with two of his usual mates – White House staffers Ben Finkenbinder and Marvin Nicholson – as well as guest player Ron Kirk, the U.S. Trade Negotiator.Okay, I shouldn’t say the president is skipping church. It’s not fair. Because actually, the president never goes to church, so he can’t exactly be said to be skipping it.Gosh, I’m really being hypocritical now, because the fact is, I don’t go to church either. But at least I have a pretty good excuse: I’m Jewish.Hmmmm....Does the scriptures say anything about aiding those who are about to be flooded Mr President?Read the full story here.

• Obama vs. Israel.(EmergingCorruption).By Alan Caruba.Is Obama a Muslim? Does Obama hate Israel? Will Israel be attacked again? Will Iran nuke Israel? Has Maghreb and Middle Eastern turmoil flummoxed the White House? Why did Obama bow to Saudi Arabia’s king? Questions, questions, questions?Watching President Barack Hussein Obama try to pick winners and losers in the Middle East would be amusing if it were not so deadly serious. Not a word about Syria’s slaughter of its protestors. A demand that Libya’s Gadhafi step aside and a quick retreat behind NATO’s skirts. Throwing Egypt’s Mubarack under the bus when saying nothing would have sufficed. And then there was the infamous and inauspicious start to his presidency with the “World Apology Tour” that included a stop in Cairo.

A May 11th Reuters news article published in the Jerusalem Post was titled “Obama may preempt PM’s speech to U.S. Congress.” Benyamin Netanyahu, at the invitation of Speaker John Boehner, will address the Congress on May 24. If President Obama delivers a speech about “political change in the Middle East and North Africa” prior to the PM, it will be impossible to deny that it is a deliberate effort to rebut in advance anything Netanyahu says.President Obama’s special envoy, George Mitchell, whose mission it was to fashion a peace between Israel and the Palestinians just rendered his resignation. He could have saved himself the bother by not even taking the job. The Israelis have given up territory and made countless concessions to the Palestinians without any reciprocity. Now the Palestinians are counting on the United Nations to unilaterally declare them a sovereign state. When not killing Israelis, they kill each other.The United Nations has a long, ugly record of hostility, passing endless resolutions condemning Israel while maintaining the Palestinians as the world’s oldest “refugee” group to the tune of millions via the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). The European Union whose World War II member nations allowed their Jews to be frog-walked to Nazi concentration and death camps has also demonstrated its hostility.America, to its credit, has always been Israel’s one true friend. During the campaign, Obama even visited the Wailing Wall to demonstrate his solidarity. Once elected, however, and to the astonishment of voters the new Obama administration was reluctant to even say that militant Islam was the enemy or to even use the word “terrorism.” It was renamed “overseas contingency operations”!Call me a cynic but I believe that the decision to kill Osama bin Laden was not taken until the 2012 elections became a priority. Why? Because three terrorist attacks, including the Fort Hood murders, had previously been swept under the rug by the Obama administration. Moreover, the Obama Justice Department continues to threaten CIA agents with jail for the aggressive interrogation techniques that led to finding bin laden.The Obama administration’s hostility to Israel and the rush to preempt the Israeli Prime Minister’s speech is a reflection the 180 degree reversal of all previous administration’s relations with Israel. The president’s national security advisor, John Brennan, has referred to Jerusalem as “Al Quds”, the Arabic name for the ancient and modern capital of Israel and the State Department continues to send funds to Hamas.New voices out of Egypt are calling for the abrogation of its peace treaty with Israel. Hezbollah has been removing its cache of long-range rockets (courtesy of Iran) from Syria as that regime faces opposition. Hamas, designated a terrorist organization worldwide, has joined hands with the PLO, negating any possibility for peace with Israel.It is bad enough when various nations openly declare their hostility to Israel, but it is very dangerous when the current regime in Washington demonstrates its hostility in subtle and not-so-subtle ways.President Harry Truman recognized Israel when it declared its sovereignty on May 14, 1948. At the time he said, “I have faith in Israel and believe it has a glorious future, not just as a sovereign nation, but as the embodiment of the great ideals of our civilization.”Israel and Americans who support it must wait for the November 2012 elections before the threat the Obama administration represents can be removed. Israel’s enemies may not be willing to wait, seeing the present regime and time as the best and possibly the last opportunity to make good on their threat to “wipe it from the map.”Hmmmm......On Thursday when he makes his speech he will stab Jews and Christians once again in the back.Read the full story here.

• "I'll put a spell on you"?Iran's Ahmadinejad 'under a spell': top cleric.(Ahram).Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has been put "under a spell" by his chief of staff Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie, an ultra-conservative cleric was quoted by local media on Sunday as saying."I've told some of my close friends that I am more than 90 percent certain that (Ahmadinejad) has been put under a spell. This is not natural at all," Ayatollah Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi, believed to have once been a mentor of the president, told the weekly Shoma."No sane person does such things unless his free will has been taken away," Mesbah Yazdi said in reference to a crisis that has erupted since mid-April between Ahmadinejad and the hardline conservative camp close to supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei."His actions have no justification. When he has 10 friends... does it make sense to constantly defy nine of them and defend (the actions of the) tenth person?" Mesbah Yazdi asked in an allusion to Mashaie.Mashaie, the president's top advisor and close relative who has worked alongside Ahmadinejad for more than 25 years, has been the target of a barrage of criticism from the conservative camp in past weeks.Mesbah Yazdi said he sensed a "great danger" lingering over Ahmadinejad because of Mashaie."I do not know if it is (because of) hypnotism, a spell or relations with yogis. But there is something wrong," said Mesbah Yazdi."It is almost as if this questionable person (Mashaie) has put this man (Ahmadinejad) under a spell, as if he has wrapped him around his finger," he said.The conservatives also accuse Mashaie of orchestrating the attempted sacking of Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi in mid-April, which was vetoed by the supreme leader.The aborted dismissal triggered an unprecedented political crisis in the higher echelons of Iran's regime, with Ahmadinejad expressing his displeasure by withdrawing from public life and official duties for 10 days.Several conservative websites have recently hinted that he may be connected to practice of dark magic, while the judiciary has announced the arrest of two "sorcerers" while stopping short of linking them to Mashaie.Hmmmm....Who you gonna call?...Ghostbusters!Read the full story here.

• The Maladives their Islamic style waste recycling.Maldives 'trashing' an island.(Al-Jazeera).Country's tourist industry fuelling waste glut, turning coral reef into 7km long rubbish dump. In a bid to battle a growing waste problem, the Maldives has been dumping almost all of its rubbish on a single one of its some 1,200 islands.Thilafushi island has turned into a dump, and environmental activists say the bad practices adopted there are causing contaminants to seep into the Indian Ocean nation's once pristine sea water, and then into the food chain.Hmmmm......Read and see the full story here.

• ‘Arab Spring’ – Winter For Israeli Security.(BigPeace).At the recent White House Correspondents Dinner in Washington, D.C., which is the equivalent of D.C.’s Academy Awards celebration – only for “less beautiful” people – President Barack Obama celebrated his roughly two years in office. The crowd of 3,000-plus, filled mostly with leftist journalists and TV and radio commentators, as well as Hollywood types, fawned over Obama, encouraging him to pursue a heightened push for his promised leftist-socialist agenda. In this regard, Seth Meyers, the primo star of “Saturday Night Live” and the master of ceremonies of the event, tried to humorously tweak the president by saying he would be even more electable in 2012 if he stood fast to the “change vision” as enunciated during Obama’s successful 2008 presidential campaign.Seth Meyers is a liberal Jew. But his call for Obama to pursue an even stronger “change agenda” had to also mean by definition that Obama should pursue even stronger anti-Israel, pro-Muslim policies – which have been a centerpiece of the Obama presidency. While it is regrettable if not tragic that many liberal Jews are insensitive to their heritage and all to easily forget the lessons of the Holocaust, Meyers’ advice to Obama was in the process of taking on even greater significance, if not irony, since plans were then in operation to kill the world’s leading anti-Jew hater, Osama bin Laden. But our “fearless leader” saw the death of OBL as less of an effort to mete out justice for the thousands killed on 9/11 and elsewhere by al-Qaida than a milestone in his push to further Muslim interests worldwide, as well as advance has own prospects for re-election in 2012.Now, this week, as has been reported widely, Obama plans an even greater and stepped-up Muslim outreach as part of his agenda for the next two years.This comes at a time when the so called “Arab Spring” – the current so-called democratic uprising in the Middle East – has produced frightening and negative results. Having pushed Egypt’s pro-American and Israel-friendly president, Hosni Mubarak, out of office, only to have installed forces sympathetic to the granddaddy of terrorist groups, the Muslim Brotherhood, which has pledged the destruction of Israel, while ignoring the opposition freedom movement in the key country in the region, Iran, Obama’s Middle East foreign policy furthers his Muslim agenda, by unleashing forces hostile to Israel and the United States.This is all happening at a time Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is coming to Washington, D.C., next week to meet with Obama in the White House and address a joint session of Congress. This moment is crucial, because as part of his Muslim outreach, Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are planning – if Netanyahu does not roll over to their Middle East pro-radical Muslim agenda – to cut Israel down to size by imposing a Palestinian state on the Jewish nation at the General Assembly meeting of the United Nations this fall.In the past, I have criticized Republicans, the professed opposition party, for not doing more to support Israel during this crucial and pivotal time. While I applaud House Speaker Boehner for being instrumental in inviting Prime Minister Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress, Republicans need to urgently make Israeli, and thus American, security a key issue of their agenda. Thus far, few Republicans, save for Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann and a handful of others, have pushed for this. Not coincidentally, Palin proudly wore a joint American and Israeli flag pin to the White House Correspondents Dinner.the time has come to get serious in Iran. Reports are that the Revolutionary Guard, the mullahs’ equivalent of the Nazi SS, is in a rebellious mood with the mullahs. We should try to foment more discontent inside of the Revolutionary Guard and arm opposition pro-freedom groups, just as we have in Libya (ironically a virtually meaningless country strategically), to begin in earnest the overthrow of the regime. If Libya, then why not even more so Iran – which, along with Israel, holds the key to greater stability in the Middle East?Republicans, sympathetic Democrats in Congress, and concerned Jews, Christians and Persians everywhere must urgently take an active role at this time, as the security of Israel, the United States and the world hangs in the balance. Obama’s Muslim outreach must not be allowed to morph further into what it truly is: a cleverly packaged anti-Semitic and anti-Christian design to harm Israel, Jews and Christians, to beat down the anti-Muslim secular revolution in Iran and to further the radical Muslim revolution worldwide. Obama may be born only half Muslim, but his actions are totally pro-Muslim! They must be stopped in their tracks now!Hmmmmm......Why do you think he got money in 2008 for his election campaign from Palestine?And why the weekly phone calls to Erdogan,who happens to be Ahmadinejad's best buddy?Read the full story here.

• When will Caliph President Obama release an "Outreach to Coptic Christians"?(NationalReview).The Arab spring unleashes Islamists on Egyptian Christians.Screaming “With our blood and soul, we will defend you, Islam,” jihadists stormed the Virgin Mary Church in northwest Cairo last weekend. They torched the Coptic Christian house of worship, burned the nearby homes of two Copt families to the ground, attacked a residential complex, killed a dozen people, and wounded more than 200: just another day in this spontaneous democratic uprising by Muslim hearts yearning for freedom.In the delusional vocabulary of the “Arab Spring,” this particular episode is known as a sectarian “clash.” That was the Washington Post’s take. Its headline reads “12 dead in Egypt as Christians and Muslims clash” — in the same way, one supposes, that a mugger’s fist can be said to “clash” with his victim’s face. The story goes on, in nauseating “cycle of violence” style, to describe “clashes between Muslims and Coptic Christians” that “left” 12 dead, dozens more wounded, “and a church charred” — as if it were not crystal clear who were the clashers and who were the clashees, as if the church were somehow combusted into a flaming heap without some readily identifiable actors having done the charring.The thugs in question were Egyptian Muslims. Were they representative of all Egyptian Muslims? No, but it would be more accurate to portray them as such than to suggest, as the Pollyanna narrative holds, that Egypt (and Tunisia, and Yemen, and Syria, and Lebanon, and Algeria, and …) is teeming with legions of Gamal al-Madisons.This is the Egypt where the toppling of the pro-American, pro-peace Mubarak regime was celebrated by the rape of CBS correspondent Lara Logan amid the familiar chants of “Allahu Akbar!” The same Egypt where, just a few weeks ago, Islamist factions wiped out the proponents of democracy by a whopping 78–22 margin in a referendum on the formation of a new government. The result ensures a Muslim Brotherhood hammerlock on the new parliament, and perhaps even the presidency — a Brotherhood leader having announced this week that he will run against the popular but weak Amr Mousa.Hmmm....This is the Muslim Brotherhood the Obama regime already pledged 1,57 Billion Dollar to for 2012.Read the full story here.

• The Facts about Obama's War On Domestic Oil and Gas.(WolfHowling).Let's go over some of the eye-opening facts about our gas and oil industry:

- Oil Prices: The major oil companies do not set the price of oil. That price is set independently by traders based on world supply and demand, the strength of the dollar, stability in oil producing regions, and weather events, among other factors.

- Oil Usage - Transportation: Per the DOE, oil accounts for 94% of the energy used in our transportation sector.

- Oil As Our Single Largest Source Of Energy: Per the DOE, oil is our single most important source of energy, accounting for 35.6% of all energy consumed in America. In comparison, solar and wind, added together account for less than 1% of all energy consumed in the U.S. There is a reason for that. Wind and solar energy are vastly more inefficient and costly than oil, gas and coal. They are not commecially viable without substantial subsidies.

- Profit Margin: While oil companies' profits may be vast, that is because their volume is vast. America uses over 20 billion barrels of oil daily. The actual profit margin across the oil industry averages less than 6 cents on the dollar. By comparison, Obama's favorite crony capitalist, GE, has a profit margin nearly 33% higher.

- Oil Companies and Taxes: The oil and gas industry is a cash cow for government. Oil and gas companies pay, on average, more than 40% of their profits in taxes. To put a number to this, over the past three years, the oil and gas industry has paid over $242 billion in taxes. Obama's favored business, GE, paid no taxes last year.

- Oil Companies and Jobs: Domestic gas and oil companies play a huge role in our private sector, supporting "9.2 million U.S. jobs and 7.7 percent of the U.S. economy."

- Reinvesting Profits: Exploring and exploiting new sources of oil is a time consuming and very expensive process. For instance, Exxon, in the first quarter of 2011, made an after tax profit of $10.65 billion. Of that, Exxon invested "$7.8 billion into capital and exploration."

- Our Trade Deficit and Foreign Oil: We are, today, transferring vast amounts of our wealth outside of the U.S. to purchase foreign oil. Approximately 62% of our monthly trade deficit comes from the purchase of foreign oil.

And then there are the law suits charging that carbon dioxide is a pollutant for which emitters are liable. Their ultimate goal is to have the courts take over our nation's energy policy. Whether carbon dioxide is a pollutant and whether it is causing "global warming" are scientific questions very much at issue and that courts are unqualified to answer. Even assuming arguendo that CO2 is a pollutant causing global warming, what to do about it is a political question with massive ramifications for our economy. It is not a question to be decided by our Courts, but by our elected representatives.Yet our federal judiciary, from the Supreme Court on down - none of whom are scientists - has shown an avid willingness to hear and decide such cases. The EPA is regulating carbon dioxide as a pollutant today under the Clean Air Act because five members of the Supreme Court felt qualified to pass judgment on this issue. Moreover, enterprising lawyers have brought suits against power companies under a nuisance theory because they are contributing to carbon dioxide in the air. These law suits are currently in the court system. If the lawyers succeed, the Courts then become the single most important arbiters of energy policy in America. On top of this, we have seen in the past week NASA's Jim Hansen, the "Bernie Madoff of climate science," file lawsuits with children as the plaintiffs seeking to have courts take complete control over our energy policy in the name of Global Warming.While Obama's attempt to punish our domestic oil and gas industry for daring to make a profit is not going to go anywhere, his and the left's larger war on that industry is "untethered from the facts." We are all going to ultimately pay the price. I am praying that we are able to elect someone in 2012 who is both capable of articulating a coherent energy policy and who is able to take our courts and the radical left out of the business of deciding our nation's energy policy.Hmmm....The 2012 election question is dead simple and serious :will you vote for "Dictatorship or Democracy"?Read the full story here.

• Union Members Blow Whistle on Labor Bosses Stealing, Promptly Beaten by Thugs, Receive Death Threats, Dead Rat Thrown in Locker.(NYDailynews).Unionized phone company employees say they were beaten or threatened after they accused their labor bosses of looting their coffers through various scams.One member of Communications Workers of America Local 1101 said that after he reported a time-sheet padding scheme, a thug beat him so badly his spine was injured.Another says he found a dead rat in his locker, while a third said a union officer warned that suspected informants should be brought off company property and "taken care of."The threats come to light as the U.S. Labor Department is probing charges that union bosses lined their pockets at the rank-and-file's expense.Accusations include an unauthorized 401(k) plan union officers gave themselves funded with members' dues, along with hefty weekly allowances, lavish expense accounts and six-figure salaries, union documents show.The feds are also looking into allegations that double-dipping union bosses illegally received pay from Verizon and the local for the same hours, sources said."This was union greed and that's worse than corporate greed," said Kevin Condy, a reform movement leader of the 6,700-member local that represents mostly Verizon workers in Manhattan and the Bronx. "These guys acted like they felt they were entitled."And, some members charge, the bosses retaliated when threatened with exposure.In August, business agent Patrick Gibbons said he received death threats and his office was vandalized after he complained that union bosses were misappropriating cash."They were warning me that if I continue to complain about their finances, they would have me killed," Gibbons wrote in an open letter to union members.Hmmmm.....Sounds like 'Chicago politics'.Read the full story here.

• Former Dem Rep. Cynthia McKinney: “The First Afro-American President of the United States Has Ashamed us All”. Former member of the US House of Representatives Cynthia Anne McKinney said she is truly ashamed of her country’s policies.Addressing an international conference dubbed ‘International Coalition against Terrorism for Fair Peace’ here in Tehran on Saturday, the former US House member urged Washington to avoid imposing its will on the world nations through the use of force, violence and weapons.“As an American, I am upset with the policies of my country, but the measures adopted by the first Afro-American president of the United States has ashamed us all,” she said.“If there is no truth, there won’t be any justice, and today the US policies are rooted in lies, injustice and war,” she continued."(the late) Martin Luther King once said that the US has guided missiles, but has no guided man," McKinney added.Hmmmm......"The means by which we live have outdistanced the ends for which we live. Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men." Martin Luther King, Jr. Read the full story here.

• Turkish Association in Germany Calls for Autonomous Government for Turks.(StopTurkey).This is my translation of statements made by a Turkish association in Germany calling itself "Generation Zukunft e.V." (Future Generation). The association is organising a protest against Thilo Sarrazin in Berlin on June 21.

We are Turks or Turkish-descended students, employees, employers and academics who live and work in Germany. Just as other citizens feel attached to their home, citizens of Turkish descent also feel attached to this country, their country of origin. Within the framework of the laws of this country, we are proud to say: "Happy those who call themselves Turks." We are aware that we bear a responsibility not only to ourselves, but to Turkey. For this reason we have come together to call "Generation Zukunft e.V." (Future Generation Registered Association) into being.(...) The organisation of young Muslim intellectuals "Generation Zukunft e.V." calls on all Turks in Germany:

You hired us as guest workers. We built your streets; set up your companies; repaired your houses. We worked day and night for the well-being of Germans, risked our health, served them, and today they want to hold us to account for it, saying it would have been cheaper if we had never immigrated to Germany as guest workers... They drum into us that we are not allowed to speak Turkish when we're sitting with our brothers and sisters in the playground. We are forbidden from living in a Turkish spirit or practising our centuries-old culture. They take our identity and force us to eat disgusting pig meat. German children always get the best toys and enjoy more freedom than our children of Turkish descent. A torture without comparison, a machinery of oppression and assimilation policy - planned and controlled by the revolting German establishment in order to crush Turks year after year for decades and to break their will and individuality. We are your slaves and prisoners, your prey animals... We want autonomy for the Turks in Germany with the objective of independent government. We want place signs in Germany to be in Turkish. In supermarkets the information must be written in Turkish script... We want North-Rhine Westphalia to be the first federal state to become an autonomous Turkish republic. At a later stage, Berlin should also become an autonomous Turkish territory and the federal government should move to Bonn. From a demographic perspective, Turks represent a considerable part of the new generation of the German population. Seen in this way, we are the future of Germany... The German government should slowly start to think deeply about who is sitting in its lap...This sounds almost too over-the-top to be true. But it does appear to be a genuine, registered association in Germany. You can see its registration here. Representatives of the organisation have previously been quoted in the Turkish press. And the coordination committee of the Turkish association wrote the following to the German organisation Christliche Mitte (Christian Centre), whose periodical brought this to light here.Don't forget. As Germany lay in rubble and ashes, the foreigners came to build the country back up. The foreigners (Turks) brought the Germans prosperity. Without the foreigners, Germans would still be standing in their rubble today. From that follows the logical conclusion: the land belongs to those who built it. Foreigners are nationals. We want: to vote here, to work here, to participate in decisions here. Therefore: the next federal chancellor and ministers must be Turkish!!! The cross must disappear! Islam is the strongest force; Islam will prevail.Hmmmm...."We don't want to take over your country'?How long before the Turks in America demand the same?Read the full story here.

• NORWAY: Blonde girls have to die their hair brown, children can’t carry salami in their lunch boxes for fear of being beaten up.(BNI).Muslim immigrants are terrorizing native Norwegians, who are fleeing in droves. An ethnic and cultural self-annihilation is taking place and the left wing cultural relativists and political elite are allowing it to happen.Read and see the full story here.

• Brussels: Half of Muslim students are antisemitic.(IslaminEurope).Half of the Muslim students in Brussels are antisemitic, according to a study 'Jong in Brussel' by the Youth Research Platform. The chapter on antisemitism was written by sociologist Mark Elchardus of the VUB. The study was conducted by the universities of Ghent, Leuven and the Dutch-speaking VUB. It polled 2,837 students in 32 Dutch-speaking high schools in Brussels.About half of the Muslim respondents in the survey agreed with the following statements:

1. Jews want to dominate everything (total: 31.4%, Muslims: 56.8%, Non-Muslims: 10.5%)
2. Most Jews think they're better than others (total: 29.9%, Muslims: 47.1%, Non-Muslims: 12.9%)
3. If you do business with Jews, you should be extra careful (total: 28.6%, Muslims: 47.5%, Non-Muslims: 12.9%)
4. Jews incite to war and blame others (total: 28.4%, Muslims: 53.7%, Non-Muslims: 7.7%)

Mark Elchardus says that the non-Muslim/ethnic Belgians responses in this study are comparable to similar polls in Flanders. "What is alarming is that you can describe half of the Muslim students as antisemitic, which is very high. What's worse is that those anti-Jewish feelings have nothing to do with a low educational level or social disadvantage, which is the case by racist Belgians. The antisemitism is theologically inspired and there's a direct link between being Muslim and having antisemitic feelings."Catholics and Protestants were also more anti-Jewish than secular students, but not as much as Muslims. Religious and practicing Christians scored on average 12 points more than the secular students. Religious Muslims scored 28 points higher. However, while very religious Christians were much more antisemitic than less religious Christians, there was no such difference among Muslims.Elchardus says that this antisemitism is also affected by the international context and the Middle Eastern conflict, though he does not accept this as the only reason. Do we become anti-Muslim when we see the Middle-Eastern dictators, he asks.Many Muslim youth live in an environment in which their families, friends and media do not curb antisemitism and possibly even encourage it.More data from the study itself:

 37% of Turkish youth said that they didn't want any Jews allowed into their country, and 19.5% only wanted to allow them in as visitors. More than half of Turkish youth were against granting Jews citizenship. 13% were ready to be friends with Jews.61% of Moroccan youth were ready to accept Jews as citizens in their country, and 22.5% were ready to be friends with Jews.Hmmmm......."Half of Muslim students are antisemitic"......And the other half practiced Al-taqiyya?Read the full story here.

• Video - French film crew tries to do a story on a local Islamic Cultural Center but gets beaten up by Muslim thugs.(BNI).Hmmm....."The religion of peace'.This will help Marine Le Penn and the Front Nationale big time!Read and see the full 'story' here.

• Europe - Dark burkas ahead!Giulio Meotti on YnetNews, 2 May 2011: Europe risks losing all its precious gifts: human dignity, freedom of conscience, freedom of religion, freedom of expression, rule of law, separation of state and mosque. Across Europe there are dozens of journalists, cartoonists and writers who are living under terrorist threats.Read the full story here.

• Showdown in the Shia Corridors of Power.(FamilySecurityMatters).“A nation from the East will rise and prepare the way for the coming of the Mahdi”-Prophet Muhammad, Hadith tradition.Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s defiance of Ayatollah Khameini, Iran’s Supreme Leader, is no laughing matter. An 11-day strike by President Ahmadinejad has ended with the arrest of 25 of his associates on the charge of sorcery – a charge which carries the penalty of death. Ahmadinejad’s Chief of Staff, Esfandiar Rahim Masheia, lies at the heart of the controversy. Rumor has it that “Mashaei allegedly occasionally enters a trance-like state to communicate with the Twelfth Imam or will sometimes randomly say ‘hello’ to no one at all and then explain that the Twelfth Imam just passed by.”Ayandeh, an Iranian news website, described one of the arrested men, Abbas Ghaffari, as "a man with special skills in metaphysics and connections with the unknown worlds".Following the 2009 elections, Ayatollah Khameini rejected Ahmadinejad’s decision to raise Mashaei to the position of First Vice President. Ahmadinejad eventually relented and made him Chief of Staff.President Ahmadinejad’s political gyrations in support of his Chief of Staff were read as a breach of the traditional power-sharing agreement in Iran. In response Ayatollah Khameini, as the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Establishment of Iran, has apparently chosen to purge the propaganda arm of a millennial cult known as the Hojatieh Society. The Hojatieh’s influence in Ahmadinejad’s inner circle is well documented. Dore Gold captures the essence of the Hojatieh Society’s political drive for power in his recent release The Rise of Nuclear Iran:

Founded in 1954, its twofold mission was to fight the Bahai faith and pave the way for the reappearance of the Mahdi. It did not accept Khomeini’s doctrine of velayat-e faqih, the rule of the jurisprudent, since the arrival of the Mahdi make a cleric to represent him in the interim unnecessary.Mubarak’s fall from power in Egypt on February 11th 2011 prompted the Iranian President Ahmadinejad to remark on the Arab Spring, “This is a global revolution, managed by the imam of the ages.” Ahmadinejad’s speech in Tehran’s Azadi Square sent alarm bells through the Qom Establishment. If the Mahdi, the Hidden Imam, had indeed returned from his occultation as Ahmadinejad was suggesting, than the institution of the vilayet-e faqih, the beating heart of the Khomeini Revolution, was no longer the source of authority in Iran. The release of an Ahmadinejad-sponsored documentary in mid-March advanced the notion that the Mahdi was orchestrating the Arab Spring.Ahmadinejad may survive the purge. Indeed, the purge may be nothing more than a dramatic hoax to satisfy Western criticism of Iran’s colorful past in the industry of state-sponsored terrorism. Only a revisionist history of Iran can dismiss the Islamic Establishment of Iran’s support of organizations ranging from Hezbollah to Hamas to Al Qaeda. At present, the only certainty is that any and all aspirations of Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei to win the Iranian Presidency have been sacrificed to the geopolitics of regional hegemony.The Western world is now witness to the spectacle of the Islamic Establishment of Iran achieving the status of “rational” actor by charging upstarts within its administration of sorcery.Hmmmm......Perhaps it's time to call in some US "Ghostbusters"?Read the full story here.

• And now for something completely different.Ancient 'debit card' discovered in Saxony-Anhalt.(TheLocal).Archaeologists in the town of Wittenberg, Saxony-Anhalt, have unearthed a 453-year-old wooden "tally stick" used to keep track of debts.“It’s something of a rare find in Europe” said archaeologist Andreas Hille from the State Museum of Prehistory in Halle, Saxony-Anhalt.The antiquated debt counter measures 30 centimetres in length and displays 23 notches, with both a name and the date 1558 visible.Archaeologists made the exciting find during excavations in the small easterly university town of Wittenberg, made famous by the Protestant theologian Martin Luther.The well-preserved tally stick was used in the Middle Ages to count the debts owed by the holder in a time when most people were unable to read or write.“Debts would have been carved into the stick in the form of small notches. Then the stick would have been split lengthways, with the creditor and the borrower each keeping a half,” explained Hille. The two halves would then be put together again on the day repayment was due in order to compare them, with both sides hoping that they matched.Read and see the full story here.

MFS - The Other News

                          Morning Posting.

• Egypt volatile situation - Al Jazeera English - Live Streams From Egypt ! Here .
• Egypt protests on Twitter!  here.
• Liveblog - Egypt's protests erupt. here.

• HT:WND.Muslim Brotherhood awakens terrorist wing.Look what Obama's support for Islamist group is doing.JERUSALEM – An Egyptian Islamist terrorist organization founded by the Muslim Brotherhood is re-establishing itself amid the political upheaval in Cairo, WND has learned. Both Egyptian and Israeli security officials said the group, Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya, is being reconstituted at the direction of the Muslim Brotherhood. The officials affirmed Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya serves as the de fact "military" wing of the Brotherhood, which originally founded Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya. Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya is suspected of involvement in the 1981 assassination of Egyptian president Anwar Sadat and it took credit for the 1995 attempted killing of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. It has carried out scores of deadly terrorist attacks, some targeting foreign tourists. Yesterday, an Egyptian security official was quoted in the news media stating Egyptian troops had arrested two armed Palestinians from Hamas who entered the country illegally from the Gaza Strip. The security official told reporters the men had crossed from Gaza into Egypt's Sinai Peninsula using smuggling tunnels and that they were arrested in a stolen car in the town of el-Arish, near the border, along with three Egyptian smugglers. The official told the Associated Press the two Hamas men were caught with weapons, hand grenades, two RPGs and about $8,600 in cash. A senior Egyptian security official speaking to WND yesterday said an investigation found the two Hamas men were aiding in the reorganization of Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya, which, he said, is attempting to reconstitute itself under the direction of the Muslim Brotherhood.In November, the Brotherhood's new supreme guide, Muhammad Badi, delivered a sermon entitled, "How Islam Confronts the Oppression and Tyranny." "Resistance is the only solution," stated Badi. "The United States cannot impose an agreement upon the Palestinians, despite all the power at its disposal. [Today] it is withdrawing from Iraq, defeated and wounded, and is also on the verge of withdrawing from Afghanistan because it has been defeated by Islamist warriors." Badi went on to declare the U.S. is easy to defeat through violence, since it is "experiencing the beginning of its end and is heading toward its demise."The information comes after the U.S. tacitly approved the Muslim Brotherhood's involvement in political dialogue in Egypt. "Today we learned the Muslim Brotherhood decided to participate, which suggests they at least are now involved in the dialogue that we have encouraged," Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in an NPR interview this past weekend from Germany. "We're going to wait and see how this develops, but we've been very clear about what we expect."Obama yesterday told reporters that talks to resolve Egypt's crisis are making progress amid negotiations between Mubarak and the opposition, including the Muslim Brotherhood. "Obviously, Egypt has to negotiate a path and they're making progress," Obama told reporters.Hmmmmm......."They don't trust me because of my middle name".Read the full story here.

• HT:TheLondonTimes.Saudis told Obama to back Mubarak.Saudi Arabia has threatened to prop up President Mubarak if the White House tries to force a swift change of regime in Egypt. In a testy personal telephone call on January 29, King Abdullah told President Obama not to humiliate Mr Mubarak and warned that he would step in to bankroll Egypt if the US withdrew its aid programme, worth $1.5 billion annually. America’s closest ally in the Gulf made clear that the Egyptian President must be allowed to stay on to oversee the transition towards peaceful democracy and then leave with dignity. “Mubarak and King Abdullah are not just allies, they are close friends, and the King is not about to see his friend cast aside and humiliated,” a senior source in the Saudi capital told The Times. Two sources confirmed details of the King’s call.Hmmm....."His masters voice"?Read the full story here.

• Obama consults Saudi King Abdullah on Egypt.(Again?)Mubarak is known to be close to King Abdullah.President Barack Obama Wednesday stressed the need for a meaningful and lasting political transition in Egypt in a telephone call with key ally King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, officials said."The President spoke today with King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia about the situation in Egypt," the White House said in a statement."The President emphasized the importance of taking immediate steps toward an orderly transition that is meaningful, lasting, legitimate, and responsive to the aspirations of the Egyptian people."The President also reaffirmed the long-term commitment of the United States to peace and security in the region."Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who is under siege after days of raging street protest is known to be close to King Abdullah, who has condemned efforts by what he said were "intruders" to interfere with Egypt's stability.US reports have suggested that regional allies have expressed deep concerns to the United States about the impact of cascading protests in the Arab world on the vital strategic region's stability.US officials however refuse to divulge comments made by foreign leaders in calls to Obama, who has said Mubarak must make the "right decision" for the future of his nation and embrace a "orderly" transition to democratic rule.Hmmmmm.......You can't bully all the people all of the time?Read the full story here.

• HT:Debka.Egypt's economy close to meltdown. Military coup near.The biggest Arab country with a population of 82 million is on the verge of breakdown as large sections of is economic machinery are shut down by spreading strikes and workers' revolts against managements appointed by the Mubarak regime and Vice President Omar's Suleiman's leadership.debkafile's sources report there are no trains since railway workers declared a general strike; the main state highways are barricaded by protesters. Egypt's 1,000-kilometer long Cairo-Aswan lifeline along the Nile was shut to traffic all day Wednesday, Feb. 9 with no sign that the army or security forces are willing or able to reopen it to traffic.As protesters continue to pour into Cairo's Tahrir Square, blocked roads are preventing produce reaching shops and markets – or even the soldiers posted in the town centers. Men of the 2nd and 9th divisions on street duty in Cairo have had no food rations for 12 hours. The disruptions threaten Egyptian towns with dire food shortages.The work forces of the big industrial complexes have downed tools and customs officers have stopped levying toll fees from the approximately 50 ships transiting the Suez Canal every day and netting the Egyptian treasury $3 billion a year, its main source of revenue.Read the full story here.

• Suleiman Says Government Will Not Tolerate Prolonged Cairo Protests.Egypt's vice president says the government will not tolerate prolonged anti-government protests in Cairo's main square, where hundreds of thousands of people gathered Tuesday in the latest effort to force the ouster of long-serving President Hosni Mubarak. Egypt's state-run MENA news agency quotes Vice President Omar Suleiman as saying that a crisis triggered by 16 days of anti-Mubarak protests in Tahrir Square must end "as soon as possible." Suleiman was speaking late Tuesday to a group of Egyptian newspaper editors. MENA says Suleiman told the editors that the presence of anti-Mubarak activists and satellite television stations in the square was making Egyptian citizens "hesitant to go to work" and disrupting daily life. He accused the satellite television stations of "insulting" Egypt, without naming them. But, Suleiman also is quoted as saying the government does not want to deal with Egyptian society using "police tools" and prefers to use dialogue to try to address the protesters' demands.The Egyptian vice president held unprecedented talks with several opposition groups on Sunday, but representatives of the Cairo street protesters did not participate.Read the full story here.

• Egypt’s ‘Hot Wind’ Exposes US Dilemma.“There’s a hot wind blowing from the east,” Scottish author John Buchan wrote in his Middle East novel “Greenmantle,” “and the dry grasses wait the spark.” Those words, written almost a century ago, could apply to the US position in the region today. Turbulent winds are blowing through the Arab world and American-backed houses of cards may fall.It’s first, to be sure, a Middle East problem. In Tunisia, Egypt, Jordan, Yemen, and perhaps elsewhere, an opposition both young and old, secular, nationalist and extremist, wants better governance, accountability, economic justice and human rights. But the United States and its interests will not be untouched by the storm.Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak isn’t Saddam or Slobodan Milosevic; he’s not a mass murderer, sociopath or criminal. He has been a close friend and ally to the US ever since President Anwar Sadat’s assassination in 1981. The US built its Mideast policy around him. The 20 years I spent traveling with half a dozen US secretaries of State, Cairo was always our first stop to coordinate with Mubarak.The problem was that our interests and his method of governance were at odds.Iran: Mubarak detested the Iranians. He sat next to Sadat when Khalid Islambouli sprayed them both with machine-gun fire. The mullahs named a street in Tehran in the assassin’s honor. The new Egyptian government won’t be as allergic to closer ties with Iran and may be less willing to back our containment policies.Counter-terrorism: the Muslim Brotherhood will prevent the al-Qaeda from establishing itself in Egypt. But that doesn’t mean the new Egypt will be so supportive of our war on terror or participate in our efforts to combat radicalism politically.Gaza: Mubarak didn’t like Israeli practices there or much care for Hamas. The next Egyptian government, even though the military will want a big say, will be more supportive of Hamas, less caring about weapons smuggled into Gaza and more critical of Israeli policies.Peacemaking: Whatever or whoever follows Mubarak won’t repudiate the treaty with Israel. The military doesn’t want a war and US aid, which topped $1.5 billion last year, is too important.But, unlike Mubarak, who met with Israeli prime ministers regularly, worked to defuse crises, supported the more moderate Palestinian Authority and worked closely with US presidents, the new Egyptian government will be less forthcoming and willing to criticize US-Israeli relations. That in turn will have a negative effect on how flexible the Israelis are prepared to be in future Arab-Israeli peacemaking.“History, like nature,” US novelist Robert Penn Warren wrote, “knows no jumps. Except backward, maybe.”Hmmmm......History repeats itself WW I ...WW II.....WW III...unless you learn from it.Read the full story here.

• HT:AhmadiyyaTimes.Pakistan's Government Is In Disarray As The Cabinet Resign And America Threatens To Cut Aid.Things are turning south in Pakistan, which is saying a lot for an already notoriously-corrupt nation.First the entire Pakistant cabinet resigned today as part of a plan to reduce the number of ministers by a third and cut government spending, according to the BBC.Second the US threatened to cut off billions of dollars in foreign aid if Pakistan refuses to free an American detained for killing two Pakistanis, according to Al-Jazeera.All this comes after signs that the White House is starting to give up on the current regime in Pakistan.Hmmmm.....So much for "Outreach to Muslims"?Read the full story here.

• 27 killed during soldiers' parade by schoolboy suicide bomber aged just TWELVE.A 'schoolboy' suicide bomber killed at least 27 soldiers and injured 40 more in an attack on a inside a military base in Pakistan.The boy, who is understood to be 12, was wearing his school uniform when he apparently wandered into the secure base and hit the parading troops, police said. The incident happened in Mardan at a military recruitment centre in the north-west of the country which has been targeted by Islamist militants.Senior police official Abdullah Khan said 27 soldiers died and around 40 were wounded, some critically.It was believed the suicide bomber walked into the facility without being checked - even though it should have been heavily guarded. No one has yet claimed responsibility for the blast.Read the full story here.

• Twitter in talks with facebook and google to sell for 10 Billion Dollar.Hmmmm.....damd bird just fell of it's branch?Read the full story here.

• HT:TerrorfreeSomalia.Two Super Tankers Pirated in Two Days by Somalian pirates.Somali Pirates Capture Supertanker, $150M Of Oil update : Giant oil tanker hijacked as piracy 'spins out of control'>Somali Pirates Hijack 2 Tankers in 2 Days Greek oil supership hijacked by pirates 24 hours after Italian ship is raided off Oman coast .Somali pirates hijack tanker carrying £93m of oil. An oil tanker flying under Greek flag was hijacked Wednesday in the North Arabian Sea, 350 nautical miles off the coast of Oman. The value of the cargo is estimated to be $150 to $200 million.Sailing from Kuwait, the tanker was bound for the Gulf of Mexico and is the second in as many days to be captured by Somali pirates who currently hold 29 ships and over 600 hostages for ransom.Hmmmm......How much longer before the international community puts some troops on the ground to wipe out these snakes?Read the full story here.

• Inhofe, EPA administrator tackle greenhouse gas regulation.WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe on Wednesday not only stood by his famous hoax declaration on global warming, but the Oklahoma Republican somewhat reluctantly tipped his hand on plans to publish a book.“I won’t tell you what it’s about, but the name of the book is ‘The Hoax,’?” he said during testimony before a House subcommittee. “I did finish it last week.’’ Inhofe was the lead-off witness at a somewhat contentious and lengthy hearing on a proposal that he and Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich., chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, are pushing essentially to kill the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate greenhouse gases. EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, the other major attraction at the hearing, testified after Inhofe. Different sides were drawn years ago on the long-running debate over climate change, its causes and what governments should do or not do to address the issue.“In other words, all pain for no climate gain,’’ he said in prepared remarks that he ignored so he could “ramble’’ through his testimony. Even if one assumes the predictions of more droughts, floods, intense storms and cases of disease are true, Inhofe said, EPA’s expected regulations will not affect that.Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., the full committee’s ranking member, said the underlying premise of the proposal is that climate change is a hoax, citing Inhofe’s long-held view. Jackson also urged lawmakers to think of their own role. “Politicians overruling scientists on a scientific question, that would become part of this committee’s legacy,’’ she said.Read the full story here.

• Egypt, US swap barbs as tension mounts.FM Abul Gheit says Obama administration 'imposing its will' on 'great friend.' White House: Process for regime change does not appear to be in line with people of Egypt. A top Egyptian minister accused the United States Wednesday of imposing its "will" on its Arab ally, even as the White House warned Cairo had fallen short of a "minimum threshold" for reform.Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit lashed out in a television interview on a day when Washington also stiffened its line towards Egyptian Vice President Omar Suleiman, who has opened a dialogue with opposition groups.Abul Gheit condemned US rhetoric on a crisis sparked by days of opposition protests in Egypt, in an interview with PBS television, complaining that Washington had called for a political transition "now" and "immediately." "When you speak about 'prompt,' 'immediate,' 'now,' as if you are imposing on a great country like Egypt, a great friend that has always maintained the best of relationship with the United States, you are imposing your will on him," Abul Gheit said."So for Americans to come and say 'Change is now,' but already we are changing. Or 'You start now,' we started last week," Abul Gheit said.The Obama administration has battled to retain a coherent line on the crisis, as it shows empathy with protestors, but tries to head off accusations, like Abul Gheit's, that it is orchestrating a wave of Middle Eastern unrest.With exchanges between President Hosni Mubarak's Egypt and Washington becoming more tense, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said the nascent dialogue between Suleiman and some opposition groups was insufficient.Gheit added that at the beginning of the Cairo protests last month he was "often angry, infuriated," by what he saw as a confusing message being sent by the US administration as the crisis unfolded.Hmmmm.......And another ally is stabbed in the back by the great "Peacemaker"?Read the full story here.

• Jewel of the Nile.Yussuf al-Qaradawi, the world’s most popular and authoritative Sunni cleric, is a Muslim Brotherhood-aligned Egyptian based in Qatar. A return to his home country would be dangerous for Israel and the West.President Barack Obama believes that lending American prestige to the Muslim Brotherhood will not pave the way for an eventual Islamist takeover of Egypt. “There are a whole bunch of secular folks in Egypt, there are a whole bunch of educators and civil society in Egypt that wants to come to the fore as well,” the president told Bill O’Reilly in a Super Bowl Sunday interview.According to the president, the way to empower America’s friends is to “get all the groups together in Egypt for an orderly transition and the one that is a meaningful transition.” As if Egypt’s liberal current isn’t weak enough already, Obama believes that the best way to ensure the sharks don’t come out on top is to throw a whole bunch of liberal guppies into the tank as well.While the parallels between Iran in 1979 and Egypt in 2011 can be overdrawn, it is foolish to pretend that they are not there. Cairo doesn’t have to literally become a Sunni version of Tehran to do terrible damage to U.S. interests and prestige in the Middle East—and to the hopes and dreams of its own people. And the Egyptians already have their own prospective Khomeini: Yussuf al-Qaradawi, the Qatar-based Muslim Brotherhood preacher who exiled himself from Egypt in 1961.Here, for example, is Qaradawi speaking about the Holocaust to the audience of his popular Al Jazeera television show on January 30, 2009 : Throughout history, Allah has imposed upon the [Jews] people who would punish them for their corruption. The last punishment was carried out by Hitler. By means of all the things he did to them—even though they exaggerated this issue—he managed to put them in their place. This was divine punishment for them. Allah willing, the next time will be at the hand of the believers. No one embodies this cultural schizophrenia better than Qaradawi, a media mogul who has risen to fame on the back of information technology and yet whose information is essentially medieval. Qaradawi approves of wife-beating, he defends female genital mutilation and signs off on female suicide bombers, and he attacks Shia for trying to subvert Sunni nations. To the Iranians, Qaradawi is perhaps not the ideal voice of Sunni Islamism, but insofar as he rises and the Americans suffer, Tehran will make its accommodations.However, the other argument is that it is not the job of the American president to promote the natural rights of others. Rather, it is his task to protect and preserve U.S. interests around the world, and peace in the Eastern Mediterranean is an important U.S. interest, as is preventing a larger regional war that might ensue from conflict between Egypt and its neighbor Israel. We might as well face the fact that the more political power that the Muslim Brotherhood wields will make that war much more likely—a war that would be not only bad for U.S. interests but also potentially catastrophic for our ally Israel, as well as to our ally Egypt.Hmmmmm........"Jewel of the Nile"Lets pray that God recalls him to the pawnshop.Read the full story here.

• HT:NorthEastIntelligence.Making Sense of Chaos.Unlike the Inept-in-Chief, his Ikhwan advisors and appointed incompetents in the U.S. State Department who have been attempting to micromanage the crisis in Egypt via remote control, there are other forces at work that have real boots on the ground in the former land of the Pharaohs.When Obama & Company declared that the transition from Hosni Mubarak’s rule to whatever is supposed to come next had to begin “now” with Mubarak’s immediate resignation, they utterly failed to account for specific provisions of the Egyptian Constitution.Not 24 hours later and still breathless from all of the overnight backpedalling, they realized the enormity of their sophomoric gaffe and then demanded that Mubarak sign all the documents necessary to transition the government to whatever it may be next and demand yet again the he get the heck out of Cairo “yesterday” Isn’t this the same kind of over-the-top, pompous American arrogance that Obama went on a world tour to apologize for? What is obvious here is that our king, The One, not only has no clothes on, but he has no alibi.Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israeli government, are you paying attention to this? Do you really want these people working as a “good offices” intermediary on the issues of Israeli sovereignty and “Palestinian” statehood? I should hope not. I should hope that Israel answers to a Higher Authority than the current occupant of the Oval Office.These are the real issues that need to be addressed to make sense of the current chaotic scenario unfolding in Egypt. Jordan and the Saudi’s are also threatened by these same forces. And Lebanon, now firmly in Iranian orbit and guarded by Hezbollah and IRGC regulars, is a time bomb whose detonation will occur much sooner than expected. It is in America’s utmost national security interest to have these issues dealt with resolutely by experienced professionals. Keeping our B-Team on the job is a recipe for an unprecedented disaster of Biblical proportions. I’m sorry to say it may be unavoidable at this late stage; it is prophetic as seen in Director Hagmann’s report on Isaiah 19.Hmmm......Amen to that.Read the full story here.

• Iranian prosecutor warns opposition against holding rally.Iran’s chief prosecutor has warned opposition supporters not to hold a rally next week, saying they can expect a response from “vigilant” Iranians if they do, the semi-official Mehr news wire reported on Wednesday. Opposition leaders Mirhossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karoubi have applied to stage a rally on Monday in support of revolts in Egypt and Tunisia, hoping the uprisings there can revive their “Green movement” which was stamped out in the months following President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s June 2009 re-election.Although the government is unlikely to permit a rally organized by people it considers “seditionists,” many Iranians have said they may attend in any case. A Facebook page dedicated to the day has more than 20,000 followers.It would be the Green movement’s first demonstration since December 2009 when eight protesters were killed and more than 1,000 arrested, ending months of mass protests during which Iran witnessed the worst unrest since the Islamic Revolution of 1979.Hmmmm........Lets see if Pres Obama will say something now?Oh yes it's considered "Meddling" strange word for what i had in mind.Read the full story here.

• HT:TheStrategyPage.A Super-Weapon That Works !Three months after the first five XM-25 grenade launchers arrived in Afghanistan, and after only 55 25mm rounds were fired in combat, the troops don't want to give these new weapons up. The XM-25s work as advertised, firing "smart rounds" that explode over the heads of Taliban hiding behind rocks or walls, or hiding in a cave or room. Enemy machine-guns have been quickly knocked out of action and ambushes quickly disrupted with a few 25mm shells. Encounters that might go on for 15 minutes or longer, as U.S. troops exchange fire with hidden Taliban, end in minutes after a few 25mm, computer controlled, rounds are fired from the XM-25. While American infantry love gadgets, they are very eager about electronics that helps them in combat. The XM-25 is all that, and the troops want more. In response, the U.S. Army decided to let the paratroopers keep the five XM-25s, and to speed up construction of an additional 36. The word has gotten around in Afghanistan, and every combat units there is asking for XM-25s. Although warned to keep operational details off public Internet forums, XM-25 users are telling stories to other combat troops of a wonder-weapon that actually works.The XM25 is still a heavy weapon, with the final version coming in at 5.5 kg (12 pounds). The 25mm shells weigh over half a pound each (270 grams). On the plus side, there is already a 25mm armor piercing round (using a shaped charge capable of penetrating over 50mm of armor) available. This makes the XM-25 capable of knocking out light armored vehicles. Then there are the new versions of 25mm round, like fuel-air explosive (or "thermobaric"). Such a shell would cause greater blast effect in an enclosed space, and actually suck most of the oxygen out of a cave or closed room long enough to make surviving troops at least a bit groggy. This gives the attacking troops an opportunity to rush in and kill the enemy, or take prisoners. In combat, every little advantage helps. With the XM-25, hiding behind rocks, trees, walls or in caves will no longer protect you. There is also a flechette ("shotgun") round. The magazine holds four rounds (which cost, on average $35 each), while the XM-25, with its 4x thermal sight, costing $25,000.Hmmmm......Wouldn't you love to have one of these at home?Read the full story here.

• HT:TheBlaze.Understanding Egypt: The twelfth Imam, and the end of days.All eyes are on Egypt right now, but we best stay focused on the apocalyptic, genocidal, death cult running Iran as well. Their nuclear program and End Times theology pose a clear and present danger to U.S. national security, as well as that of our allies, especially Israel.The leaders in Tehran could not be more excited by the revolution now underway in Egypt and are praying the Mubarak regime collapses and the Muslim Brotherhood come to power. For them, such events would be dramatic new evidence that the End of Days has come, infidel Arab regimes are on the road to collapse, Western influence in the Mideast is declining, Israel is one step closer to being annihilated, and the Twelfth Imam is one step closer to arriving and establishing the worldwide Islamic kingdom known as the “caliphate.”Last Friday, the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei – Iran’s so-called Supreme Leader – publicly praised Egypt’s uprising. Indeed, he called it part of the very same “Islamic awakening” that began with the Islamic Revolution in Iran in January and February of 1979. Khamenei is the same man who said last July that he had personally met with the Twelfth Imam. He is the same man who said last July that he was the personal representative of the Mahdi on earth and that all Muslims must “obey him.” He is also the same man who is working hand-in-glove with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his country’s military to develop nuclear warheads and the ballistic missiles to deliver them.Few leaders in the West truly understand how dangerous Khamenei or Ahmadinejad are because they have not carefully examined their eschatology or End Times theology. Let’s take a moment to do so.The Twelfth Imam XE “Mahdi, the (the Twelfth Imam, the Hidden Imam)” was a real, flesh-and-blood person who lived during the ninth century AD. Like the eleven Shia leaders who went before him, he was an Arab male who, as a direct descendent of the founder of Islam, was thought to have been divinely chosen to be the spiritual guide and ultimate human authority of the Muslim people.His actual name was Muhammad Ibn Hasan Ibn Ali, and it is generally believed by Shias that he was born in Samarra, Iraq, in AD 868. Before he could reach an age of maturity, when he could teach and counsel the Muslim world as was believed to be his destiny, Ali vanished from human society. Some say he was four years old, while others say five and some say six. Some believe he fell into a well in Samarra but his body was never recovered. Others believe the Mahdi’s mother placed him in the well to prevent the evil rulers of the time from finding him, capturing him, and killing him—and that little Ali subsequently became supernaturally invisible. This is where the term “Hidden Imam” is derived, as Shias believe that Ali is not dead but has simply been hidden from the sight of mankind—Shias refer to this as “occultation”—until the End of Days, when Allah will reveal him once again.Shias believe the Mahdi will return at the end of history—during a time of chaos, carnage, and confusion—to establish righteousness, justice, and peace. When he comes, they say, the Mahdi will bring Jesus with him XE “Jesus, role of in Shia eschatology” . Jesus will be a Muslim and will serve as his deputy, not as King of kings and Lord of lords as the Bible teaches, and he will force non-Muslims to choose between following the Mahdi or death.Hmmmm......Doesn't sound very Jesus like to me?Read the full story here.

• Cantor plans to give Obama a business lesson at White House lunch.When the House Republican leaders arrive at the White House to meet with President Obama for lunch Wednesday, Majority Leader Eric Cantor plans to tell the president that he may still not understand how business works in America.Cantor told reporters Tuesday that if given the opportunity, he will explain to the president that businesses do not have a “responsibility” to the nation or to the government in the way Obama explained in his speech to the Chamber of Commerce earlier this week.“If we’re going to correct the ailing economy, and put us back on the path to growth, we’re going to have to create an environment that businesses will want to come here. Will want to deploy capital here. Will want to invest in research and innovation here. That’s how we lead in America,” Cantor said. “It’s not because Washington says, ‘Go do that,’ and businesses then go and do that. That’s not who we are. So again, I’ll have hopefully this discussion with the president tomorrow.”“That’s not how it works,” Cantor said. “Because Washington says so — that business or anyone should respond as far as spending money — it’s just anathema to the way I think America works…Washington doesn’t just wave a magic wand and necessarily, business creates jobs.”Cantor will join House Speaker John Boehner and Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy at the meeting. White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said the president is planning to have “a heavy discussion on the economy and on spending.”Hmmmmm......Democracy or Communist plan bureaucracy?Read the full story here.

• HT:DougRoss.Obama's "tough budget cuts" in pictures.President Obama's 2012 budget will be roughly $3,800,000 million ($3.8 trillion).The anticipated 2012 budget deficit will be $1,500,000 million ($1.5 trillion). This means we are borrowing that amount from our children to fund all of the Democrats' Utopian spending programs.Finally, the president has proposed "tough budget cuts" that total $775 million. No, that's not a joke.Let's illustrate the magnitude of Obama's cuts.Hmmm......"Change" yeah whatevah!Read and SEE the full story here.

• U.S.-Pakistan relations strained further with case of jailed diplomat.The Obama administration has suspended all high-level dialogue with Pakistan, a key U.S. partner in the Afghanistan war, over the case of an American diplomat the Pakistanis have detained on possible murder charges, U.S. and Pakistani officials said. The case of Raymond Allen Davis, who has admitted he fatally shot two Pakistanis he said threatened him from a motorcycle while he was driving in Lahore on Jan. 27, has severely strained relations between the two governments and threatens to scuttle a planned summit among U.S., Afghan and Pakistani leaders scheduled for the end of this month in Washington. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton canceled a meeting last weekend with Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi at an international security conference in Munich to protest Allen's detention, according to officials from both countries who were not authorized to discuss the situation on the record.The administration has twice summoned Pakistani Ambassador Husain Haqqani to the White House for formal complaints and demands that Pakistan recognize Davis's diplomatic immunity and release him immediately. The message was repeated in a meeting in Islamabad Monday between Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari and U.S. Ambassador Cameron Munter.Although the administration has been unequivocal in its insistence that Davis has diplomatic status, it has been less than clear on the nature of his job in Pakistan over the last two years. An early embassy statement said it was "security" related, while officials in Washington have said that he vetted questionable visa applicants. The CIA has declined to comment on the case.On Thursday, the Lahore court extended Davis's detention for another eight days. The U.S. Embassy complained that it was given no notice of the hearing, that Davis had no attorney present, and that he was not provided with an interpreter. "He was denied due process and a fair hearing," the statement said. "His continued detention is a gross violation of international law."Hmmmm.....Lets give them another Ten Billion Dollars?Read the full story here.

• The New York Times Covers Up for Its Favorite Muslim Brother.New York Times’ “moderate” Tariq Ramadan caught on unearthed video calling down divine vengeance on those he considers Allah’s enemies.Ramadan is usually extremely guarded in his public speech. However, Americans for Peace and Tolerance has obtained – and Palestinian Media Watch has translated — a sermon delivered by Ramadan in Paris in 2008, where he strays from the usual talking points about peace and democracy.

Allah, we ask You because You are Allah. Allah, strengthen the faith of our brothers and sisters in Palestine. Allah, strengthen their faith in Palestine and make them triumphant over their enemy, Your enemy, the enemy of Islam with Your mercy, oh Generous One.Allah, strengthen their faith in Palestine, in Chechnya, Afghanistan, in Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, in Egypt, Sudan, Kashmir, and in every land, and on every battlefield. Allah, strike our enemies, Your enemies, the enemies of Islam.

This prayer in Arabic belies Ramadan’s lip-service to peace and democracy. It also exposes his true feelings toward the Muslim Brotherhood’s political opponents – as well as what he would like to see happen to them. It is important to note here that in Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia, those considered enemies by the Islamists movements may well be dictatorial regimes. But in Kashmir, what Ramadan characterizes as the “enemy of Allah” is India – a vibrant, though infidel, democracy. In “Palestine,” it’s Israel, the only democracy in the Middle East. In the Sudan it’s the oppressed black African tribes in Darfur and in Southern Sudan, who have had to endure genocide and enslavement for decades at the hands of Omar Bashir’s Muslim Brotherhood-inspired regime. And in Afghanistan… – it’s us, the United States. This sermon doesn’t sound like a call for nonviolent democratic forces to bring about peace in the Middle East. It sounds like a call to arms against perceived enemies – the U.S. included – under the banner of Islam with the sanction of Allah. We’ll send it along to the New York Times, but somehow we don’t imagine they’ll judge it “news that’s fit to print.”Hmmmmm.........It's called Al-taqiyya !Read and see the full story here.

• Cantor: Continuing Resolution Will De-fund ObamaCare.House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) told CNSNews.com today that “one way or the other” the upcoming continuing resolution necessary to keep the government funded through fiscal 2011 will deny funding to the ObamaCare law.At his weekly press briefing, CNSNews.com asked Cantor, "On the CR [continuing resolution], when that bill comes to the floor, will there be any funding for the health care reform law in it?"Cantor said, “I expect to see, one way or the other, the product coming out of the House to speak to that [ObamaCare funding] and to preclude any funding to be used for that."Michael Steel, spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), told CNSNews.com in an e-mail that House Republicans were committed to denying funding for what he described as a “job destroying” law.“[M]ake no mistake, House Republicans are committed to repealing ObamaCare (which we have already voted to do) and--if the Senate fails to act on repeal--we will use every means at our disposal to stop this job-destroying law,” Steel said.Read the full story here.

• Obama to propose relief for states burdened by debt from unemployment benefits.States that have borrowed billions of dollars from the federal government to cover the soaring cost of unemployment benefits would get immediate relief from the Obama administration under a plan to suspend interest payments for the next two years.The proposal, which will be included in the budget request President Obama will send to Congress next week, would allow states to avoid raising taxes on employers to cover the payments - which are projected to total $3.6 billion through 2012, according to independent estimates. Obama also would suspend automatic hikes in the federal unemployment tax scheduled to hit employers in nearly half of the states by the end of next year. But starting in 2014, Obama would target companies for sharply higher payroll taxes to help states replenish their depleted unemployment funds and repay their debts to Washington.Republicans quickly blasted the proposal, calling it a tax increase that employers can ill afford. "I strongly urge the White House to reconsider this job-destroying proposal," Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), the senior Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, said in a statement. "Either employers will have less money to hire or workers will face reduced wages. Neither makes any sense and runs counter to our shared goal of getting the American people back to work." Rep. Dave Camp (R-Mich.), chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, said the plan "isn't going anywhere in the House." He added, "We need to reform our unemployment programs, [but] employers are demanding reforms to the unemployment program, not higher taxes on job creation."Business groups, too, were skeptical. "What's being proposed by the White House would be very helpful and a big boost in the short term," said Kevin Brinegar, president of the Indiana Chamber of Commerce, whose members face higher taxes starting in April to repay the state's $2 billion loan. But the prospect of big tax increases after 2014, he said, "would be pretty devastating."Hmmmm...... Change you can see?Read the full story here.

• AP sources: Obama to propose cuts in heating aid. President Barack Obama wants to cut $2.5 billion from a $5 billion home heating aid program for the poor, two people familiar with his 2012 budget proposal said Wednesday, halving the popular fund as he looks for places to rein in federal spending.The proposal would cut the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program to its 2008 level of about $2.5 billion.The individuals, including a congressional aide who was briefed on the proposal, discussed the details on condition of anonymity because Obama's spending plan has not been issued. It was being released on Monday, and covers the budget year beginning Oct. 1.Separately, House Republicans on Wednesday outlined a plan for $35 billion in immediate spending cuts that would practically eliminate the program's contingency fund, cutting it by $400 million. The fund totaled $490 million, according to the program's website.Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., urged Obama not to cut the funding. He said more than 3 million families would lose assistance."I've always supported serious efforts to restore fiscal sanity, but in the middle of a brutal, even historic, New England winter, home heating assistance is more critical than ever to the health and welfare of millions of Americans, especially senior citizens," Kerry said.Obama has said tough choices must be made about how to spend scarce federal dollars to rein in spending and reduce the budget deficit and the nation's mounting debt.Hmmmm......"We feel your pain"....while vacationing all over the world with 3000 friends?Read the full story here.

• 100 UC Irvine faculty members ask district attorney to drop charges against Muslim students.A group of 100 faculty members at UC Irvine signed a letter asking the Orange County district attorney to drop criminal charges against 11 Muslim students who disrupted a speech by the Israeli ambassador to the United States.The group, including five deans, said the Muslim Student Union was wrong to disrupt the speech last year by Ambassador Michael Oren but that the students and the group had already been disciplined by the university.Orange County prosecutors announced last week they were charging the students with two misdemeanor counts, including conspiracy to disrupt the speech. If convicted, each faces up to six months in jail.The decision to charge the students, the faculty letter says, “sets a dangerous precedent for the use of the criminal law against nonviolent protests on campus.”Hmmmmm........Painting Jewish stars on windows is non violent also ,so that's allowed also?It's Anti semitism and nothing else!Read the full story here.

• Susan Rice warns GOP against U.N. cuts.United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice said today that the success America has had in using sanctions against Iran should give pause to Republicans who want to weaken U.S. ties to the institution. The new House majority has renewed pressure on the United Nations, seeking to cut some U.S. funding for the body and to tie further funding to reform efforts.“A lot of the [GOP] members that are leading on this issue have had longstanding positions critical of the United Nations,” Rice told POLITICO in an interview Wednesday. “I think it’s important for them to recall the importance of this institution for our national security interests.” For conservatives who want to maintain pressure on Iran, she said, “it would be a lot harder to do it with any efficacy without the ability to do it multilaterally through the Security Council to get the tough sanctions that we did last year.” The U.N. process, she said, also was critical in keeping Russian anti-aircraft systems out of Iranian hands, as well as preventing Chinese investment in the country’s oil industry and European investment in its financial sector.In the interview, Rice called for Congress to vote against legislation being considered in the House today that would withdraw $179 million the U.S. has already paid into the U.N. Tax Equalization Fund. The funding compensates the U.N.’s American employees who pay U.S. taxes, because workers from other nations don’t. The U.S. has overpaid into the fund, but the Obama administration has agreed to let the body use the money for long-overdue upgrades to the dilapidated United Nations complex, security improvements that both the U.N. and the City of New York say are critical.Hmmmm.......And it would affect my jetset lifestyle?Where Has Susan Rice, our UN Ambassador, Been This Past Year?Read the full story here. Related :  House Rejects GOP Effort to Make UN Give Back $179 Million Overpayment of Fund. Here.

• HT:TranslatingJihad.Fatwa: "The People of the Book Disgraced (Themselves) and Their Dhimmi Covenant by Distorting What (Allah) Sent".This fatwa comes from Shaykh Faysal al-Mawlawi, the Deputy Chairman of the European Council for Fatwa and Research, and is posted on IslamOnline.net. Here Shaykh al-Mawlawi explains that only the Qur'an has been preserved and protected by Allah, whereas the Bible has been corrupted and distorted by the Jews and Christians. He further argues that one reason for the Jews and Christians doing this was to wipe out all reference to Muhammad in the Bible, which Muslims often claim was originally in there.Question: I have a question, if you would be so kind as to answer it: the Most High said, "We have, without doubt, sent down the Message; and We will assuredly guard it (from corruption)" [Qur'an 15:9]. Does this mean the Qur'an only, or does it also comprise the Torah and the Gospel? How is the preceding verse reconciled with the saying of the Almighty: "And before thee also the messengers We sent were but men, to whom We granted inspiration: if ye realize this not, ask of those who possess the Message" [Qur'an 16:43]?May Allah bless and benefit you.Answer: In the name of Allah, praise be to Allah, and peace be upon the Messenger of Allah.Allah Almighty sent down the Torah and the Gospel, and charged the Jews and Christians with guarding them. They (however) distorted and changed them. Then He sent down the Qur'an, and made it the eternal constitution for Muslims. Therefore Allah ensures its preservation (alone), excluding the rest of his books. The People of the Book disgraced (themselves) and their dhimmi covenant by distorting what (Allah) sent to them. The Almighty said, "...[those who] displace words from their (right) places..." [Qur'an 4:46], (and) "...they change the words from their (right) places..." [Qur'an 5:41]. There are many evidences in the Book of Allah Almighty and the Pure Sunnah to the distorting of the Torah and the Gospel. This indicates that Allah has preserved the Qur'an (alone), excluding the rest of his books.Read the full story here.

• Turkey to procure Chinook helicopters.Turkey has nearly completed the process to procure giant Chinook helicopters that can carry fighter jets in the air. The US Congress has approved the sale of the Chinooks to Turkey, which is considering buying six or 10 of these helicopters. The cost will be a minimum of $1 billion. These lift helicopters can seat 60 people on board and carry other aircraft, such as F-16 jets. These helicopters can also be used to lift and transport mechanized vehicles or heavy artillery systems. Many countries, including Greece, the UK, Italy and Egypt, employ these helicopters in their militaries. The helicopters Turkey is buying will be used in the Land Forces and the Special Forces Command. Until now, the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) has relied on Blackhawks and Cougars for transporting artillery and aircraft.Following approval in the US Congress, the defense industry undersecretary has been involved in talks with its American counterpart. Turkey demands, in addition to the payment it will make for the helicopter, that some Turkish defense industry companies be assigned a certain number of jobs.Hmmmm......Don't tell me they will take away some more American jobs?Read the full story here.

• Not again! Icelandic volcano set to erupt dwarfing last year's devastation, warn scientists.Scientists in Iceland are warning that another volcano on the island looks set to erupt, threatening to spew-out a blanket of dust that would dwarf last year's eruption.Geologists detected the high risk of a new eruption after noticing an increased swarm of earthquakes around the island's second largest volcano Bárdarbunga.Pall Einarsson, a professor of geophysics at the University of Iceland, says the area around Bárdarbunga is showing signs of increased activity, which provides 'good reason to worry'. Last year's eruption of volcanos near Eyjafjallajokull, located in the south of the island, caused chaos around the world as hundreds of planes were grounding due to dust and ash filling the sky.Mr Einarsson told the country's national TV station 'RC:v' that a low number of seismometer measuring devices in the area is making it more difficult to determine the scale and likely outcome of the current shifts.The geologist complained that the lack of coverage from measuring devices means he cannot accurately detect the depth and exact location of the increased number of localised earth movements.'This is the most active areas of the country if we look at the whole country together,' he told Icelandic TV News. 'There is no doubt that lava there is slowly growing, and the seismicity of the last few days is a sign of it.The last recorded eruption of Bárdarbunga was in 1910, although vulcanologists believe its last major eruption occurred in 1477 when it produced a huge plume of ash and pumice and the largest known lava flow during the past 10,000 years on Earth.It is the second largest volcano on Iceland and is directly above the mantle of molten rock.Hmmm......The volcano has been showing increased activity since September 2010,to state that it might erupt soon is perhaps a bit exagerated,saying an eruption may occur within the following year might be  more accurate.Read the full story here,more on this story here ,here and here.