NWO WATCH:RFID Journal Launches RFID Health-Care Event

RFID Journal has announced plans to produce a one-day conference focused on helping health-care providers understand how the technology can help them improve patient safety, hospital operations and supply chain efficiencies. The workshop, titled RFID in Health Care, will be held on Jan. 23, 2008, at the Westin Casuarina Las Vegas Hotel. This event will be collocated with the second annual Summit on Healthcare Supply Chain Management, produced by World Congress. "The application of RFID in the health-care sector is a very hot topic these days, so we're excited about this event," says Mark Robert, founder and editor of RFID Journal. "This is the one event where health-care professionals can get objective advice and learn how and where they can benefit from using RFID. And because it is collocated with the Summit on Healthcare Supply Chain Management, health-care providers can benefit from attending both events." Educational seminars at RFID in Health Care will cover the following topics:
Patient Monitoring: Learn how hospitals are using RFID to track patients from check-in to checkout, reducing the time nurses spend collecting information, confirming patient identities and improving patient outcomes.
Asset Tracking: Hospitals often have many assets that are underutilized. Real-world case studies will show how RFID systems can be employed to track assets in real time, improving asset utilization, lowering maintenance costs and reducing the need to purchase additional assets.
Supply Chain Tracking: Hospitals purchase high-value pharmaceuticals and other supplies that can get stolen, lost or misplaced. Learn how RFID can help better track goods from major suppliers, as well as reduce costs and shrinkage.
Patient Safety: RFID can be used not only to ensure that patients are never given the wrong drugs, but also to prevent the misidentification of surgical patients, make sure sponges are not left in patients and ensure that surgical instruments are properly sterilized.
Automated Billing: Some hospitals have begun to use RFID to automatically identify patients, the procedures they undergo and the medicines they are given so that bills can be generated automatically, thereby reducing labor and ensuring that the hospitals are paid for care delivered....

To read more go to:

http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/articleview/3700/1/1/

As in the days of Noah....

BIG BROTHER WATCH:Your official ID cards may face permanent expiration

Oscar Valdez sacrificed a recent Wednesday afternoon to sit in the back of a crowded room full of people. No problem, the Edinburg resident told himself. One afternoon in line and he wouldn’t have to renew his driver’s license again for four years. But Valdez and any other U.S. citizen who plans to use a bank, hospital or federal service after 2010 may have to make another license renewal trip a little sooner than expected. Although Congress passed the Real ID Act more than two years ago, few people know what it is or what it means for them when it is enforced at the end of 2009. Even lawmakers are still trying to figure out what it means. All they have are a set of goals: eradicate fraudulent IDs, cut down on identity theft and consolidate several forms of identification into one harder-to-get card. State legislators and local business owners worry about the cost of issuing and cataloging so many new IDs. Texas lawmakers expect the cost of doing it to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars, with the feds pledging to reimburse 20 percent of the cost to each state. As Valdez waited in line at the Texas Department of Safety’s office in McAllen late this summer, he mostly worried about the inconvenience of getting a new ID. “It will be a challenge for people from out of town who do not have access to personal documents,” he said. “But at the same time, it would help protect us.”

Why you need a new ID

Freddy Falceson, 41, has driven for years, and he has always renewed his license when necessary. He doesn’t understand why he now might have to present a photo ID, birth certificate, proof of residence and a Social Security card to get a new driver’s license. “I can produce all the documents, but I don’t have them right now,” Falceson said. “I’d have to search for them.”That’s exactly the point.Politicians passed the Real ID Act so U.S. citizens would have to take the extra steps to prove their identities. It was a security measure recommended by Congress’ commission on the 9/11 terrorist attacks, which reported that hijackers used fraudulent IDs to board aircraft. According to the 9/11 staff report, many of the hijackers used passports “manipulated in a fraudulent manner” to board flights although it does not go into specifics about how the passports were manipulated. The new IDs also require machine readable technology, such as bar codes many states already use. Federal officials said this would make the cards more difficult to forge. Those in favor of Real ID have said standardizing the look of state-issued drivers’ licenses would make it easier for security officers to detect manipulated documents, which in turn would beef up security. So states must begin issuing cards compliant with Real ID standards by December 2009. If they don’t, residents of those states will have to bring a photo ID, Social Security card, birth certificate and proof of residence each time they use a federal service, such as a bank, hospital or air travel. That doesn’t mean all residents will have to get new cards in 2009. It just means states must begin phasing the old cards out then. Politicians say that day can’t come soon enough. U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, who sits on the House Homeland Security Committee and represents Starr and western Hidalgo counties, said Real ID makes it easier for security officers on the border to protect the country. The Real ID Act gives Americans one type of ID card, and it cuts down on security headaches, Cuellar said.

Critics call Real ID intrusive

Some worry that the Real ID Act will force the country to issue a national ID card, which they call intrusive and a danger to liberties. In February 2005, the American Civil Liberties Union first attacked the policy with a letter to the House of Representatives. The letter called the bill “an unnecessary assault on privacy and the rights of refugees and other immigrants that does very little to enhance the security of our country.” The letter expressed worries that Real ID links driving privileges to immigration status, and it describes a scenario in which legal citizens and others who appear foreign would find it harder to renew and obtain driver’s licenses. A coalition of other concerned liberties and immigrants’ rights groups sent a similar letter to Congress, echoing concerns over Real ID creating a national ID card. Nineteen groups signed the coalition letter, ranging from the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse to the League of United Latin American Citizens. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security counters by saying all licenses will look the same, but they will continue to be issued by states rather than a federal agency. The act also does not require states to transmit license information to a federal agency or database. Homeland Security officials say it will have no greater access to personal information than it does now. Still, the ACLU and others continue to oppose the measure for the difficulty it posses to immigrants and the potential of a federal database.

States must prepare to issue new IDs

Like in most other states, Texas officials don’t know how they will issue new IDs to the state’s more than 23 million residents. Homeland Security officials have not released final requirements for what will make licenses REAL ID compliant, and state lawmakers have not locked down funding to make their IDs compliant. Until those two things happen, the states can’t really move forward with their Real ID compliance. “We’re still waiting on the rules from the federal government,” said Tom Vinger, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Safety. “So, in a sense it’s a moot point.” The states, however, will be responsible for most of the cost to comply with the new law. Texas lawmakers said they will push the federal government and others to help pay these costs, but there is also a strong possibility that some of the burden to cover the state’s roughly 80 percent portion will fall to residents. As federal officials iron out the exact timeline and requirements for Real ID, many states have passed legislation excoriating the requirements. These bills range from legislation in Arizona that calls for Congress to repeal the unfunded mandate to a bill in Montana that plain opposes the act. For now, state governments can only wait. Texas lawmakers said they expect to work out more of the requirements during the 2008 legislative session, and the paramount task stands to be educating a general public that is almost entirely oblivious to the Real ID program — especially because many state and federal lawmakers are waiting to learn the specifics themselves. Cuellar said he expects major awareness campaigns to launch once the details become clear. “This is something we need to start talking about more and more,” he said.

http://www.themonitor.com/news/real_5910___article.html/security_states.html

As in the days of Noah.....

BECAUSE YOU KNOW THE TRUTH....

"I have not written unto you because you know not the truth,but because ye know it,and that no lie is of the truth.
Who is a liar but he that denies that Jesus is the Christ?He is antichrist,that denieth the Father and the Son.
Whosoever denieth the Son,the same hath not the Father:[but]he that acknowledgeth the Son hath the Father also.
Let that therefore abide in you,which ye have heard from the beginning.If that which ye have heard from the beginning shall remain in you,ye also shall continue in the Son,and in the Father.
And this is the promise that he hath promised us,even eternal life."
1 JOHN 2:20-25

Jihad Kids - Islamic Seeds of Hate and Martyrdom

To watch these pics,go to:

http://www.usvetdsp.com/dec06/slide_hate/index.html

PS:These people is honest it seems in what they are doing...Then tell me that Islam is not idol worship......

As in the days of Noah.....

Claim that Hilary Clinton Presidency is Motive for Huge New Abortion Centers:Life Dynamics says ailing abortion industry relying on 'universal health

DENTON,Texas-According to Mark Crutcher, President of Life Dynamics, the abortion industry in America, particularly abortion giant Planned Parenthood (PP), is experiencing both a financial and a service demand crisis. In an entry entitled "On the Trail to Rodham and Gomorrah" on his Life Dynamics blog, Crutcher asserts that abortion providers are looking to the likes of Hillary Clinton to bolster the floundering abortion industry.Life Dynamics is a pro-life website that offers many resources to assist the pro-life movement throughout America. They are most notably known for their part in exposing those involved in the illegal sale of body parts taken from aborted babies. The motto of the site as stated on their website is: "Pro-life: Without compromise. Without exception. Without apology."Crutcher begins his article drawing attention to the new abortion facilities that PP has deceptively constructed while using false names to apply for the necessary building permits. The most notable example is the PP abortion mega-center that was recently constructed in Aurora, Illinois under the company name of Gemini, Inc. Crutcher claims that the motives behind such secrecy are much more crucial and worthy of note than the actual secrecy itself.To explain, Crutcher's article reveals that, despite the few newly opened facilities, the number of abortion facilities has steadily declined since the 1980's due to their inability to retain staff. While the abortion industry frequently blames their staff retention issues on fear of violence directed at abortion staff from pro-life forces, Crutcher dispels this as a mere myth by quoting statistics from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health that show that "during the period of the greatest violence against abortionists in history, more farmers and twice as many hairdressers were murdered on the job than abortion clinic workers and abortionists combined."Instead, Crutcher partially blames the abortion industry's collapse on the public stigma that is naturally associated with the killing of an unborn child."The abortion lobby had always counted on legalization to erase the stigma of abortion, but that never happened. What they refused to accept was that abortion is like pornography and prostitution in that the stigma is related to the act itself and not to its legal status. That means the stigma is never going to go away. Today, the abortion industry finally seems resigned to this and has decided that the stench of abortion is something they will just have to live with." Crutcher continues to give an in-depth analysis of the grim financial situation that abortion providers find themselves facing today. Due to statistics that show that when the cost of abortion is raised, the number of abortions plummet, most abortion facilities still charge between $300 - $500 to perform an abortion - almost the exact price that an abortion cost when it was first legalized in the 1970's."They need higher abortion prices to solve their financial problems, but the lowered abortion rate produced by these higher prices would threaten their political survivability… …The problem they now face is that the cost of doing business has risen dramatically during that time. So while a $350 abortion may have been profitable in 1973 dollars, it may not be profitable in today's dollars."Crutcher warns that PP's key motivation in constructing new facilities despite these figures is the universal health care plans proposed by the leading Democratic contenders in the current presidential campaign. Crutcher posits that, in the advent of universal health care coverage of abortion, abortion prices will skyrocket with the assurance that tax-payer funded coverage will foot the bill."That is also why the nation's death merchants see Hillary Care as their salvation. They are relying on socialized medicine to solve their current financial problems by converting every $350 private-pay abortion into a $3000 government-pay abortion. The icing on the cake is that, since the customers will be offered these abortions for "free," the abortion rate is guaranteed to skyrocket."The universal health plans proposed thus far in the campaign corroborate Crutcher's assertions. Senator Obama and Elizabeth Edwards, speaking for her husband at a campaign event, pledged to include "reproductive services" in their universal health care plans. Both campaigns confirmed that these services would include abortion. Senator Clinton's proposed plan does not explicitly refer to abortion coverage but instead alludes to 'family planning' coverage for all women, a phrase frequently used by political pundits to cloak the stigma of abortion. Clinton is well known as a self-proclaimed champion of the Prevention First Act which provided 'reproductive health' services to low income women and mandated prescription contraceptive coverage by insurance companies.

See Mark Crutcher's entire article at:

http://www.markcrutcherblog.com/...

http://www.lifesitenews.com/

As in the days of Noah.....

SIGN of the TIMES:Dutch turn out to protest at magic mushroom ban

PROTESTORS turned out on Amsterdam's central Dam Square today, hoping to stop the Government from banning magic mushrooms and asking to "save the 'shrooms".Carrying banners reading “When will they ban bread?” and “Boss of your own brain”, more than 100 people, some wearing hats resembling the bright red cap of the popular fly agaric variety, protested to keep hallucinogenic mushrooms legal.After several incidents involving tourists - in March, a French teenager jumped to her death from a bridge after taking mushrooms - the Dutch Government plans to ban them.Arno Adelaars, author of a book on magic mushrooms, said this would only drive users underground and what was needed instead was better information how to use mushrooms right.“It's only foreigners who have this problem, the Dutch don't because they have good information,” he said.“Amsterdam is like a pilgrimage for youngsters in Europe, they come here to get high in all kinds of ways.“The typical young tourist that comes here drinks an awful lot of beer, smokes an awful lot of grass, and then takes mushrooms.

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,22661189-401,00.html

PS:Amsterdam and the rest of Europe need JESUS soooo bad!!!!!!!!!

As in the days of Noah....

Iraq's vulnerable Christian minority gets promise of support

BAGHDAD,Iraq-Iraq's prime minister pledged Saturday to protect and support the Christian minority that has been fleeing the chaos and sectarian violence in the country.After receiving the Chaldean patriarch of Baghdad, Emmanuel III Delly, Nouri al-Maliki affirmed his government's readiness and determination to defend the small community. He also vowed to stop the outflow of Iraqi Christians, according to a statement released by al-Maliki's office.Delly, who is the head of Chaldean Church in Iraq and spiritual leader to all Chaldeans, has been outspoken about the need to protect minority Christians from Iraq's spiraling violence.Earlier this month, Pope Benedict XVI appointed Delly a cardinal, when he named 23 new "princes" of the Roman Catholic Church.The Christian community here, about 3 percent of the country's 26 million people, is particularly vulnerable, and has little political or military clout to defend itself.
Since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, Iraqi Christians, who are mostly Chaldeans, have been targeted by Islamic extremists who label them "crusaders" loyal to U.S. troops.Churches, priests and business owned by Christians have been attacked by Islamic militants.Seeking better and safer life, about 50 percent of Iraq's Christians are thought to have left the country, according to a report issued by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, which advises the White House and Congress.

http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/10/27/iraq.christians.ap/index.html

As in the days of Noah...

China digs deeper into Africa

Johannesburg - China has served notice it is accelerating its investment drive in Africa towards full throttle with the planned $5.6bn cash purchase of a major stake in Standard Bank by Beijing's biggest lender.China's ICBC bank said on Thursday it is to buy 20% of South Africa's Standard Bank, the biggest foreign acquisition by a Chinese commercial bank yet.So far, China has focused its African ventures on mining companies as well as oil to feed its exploding economy.The planned acquisition - which will also be the largest foreign investment in Africa - leaves no doubt that China has bigger things in mind."It opens our eyes to the fact that China's strategy is about more than state-owned mining companies. A big investment in a major South African financial institution in Africa is a step up," said Philip Alves, an economist at The South African Institute of International Affairs (SAIIA).ICBC's stake in Standard Bank will give it sustained leverage to penetrate financial networks in South Africa - the continent's biggest economy - as Beijing pushes major state firms to expand abroad, particularly in developing countries.
Benefits will flow both ways
Johannesburg-based Standard Bank operates in 18 African countries, including South Africa, and 21 other countries across the world.Benefits will flow both ways, an idea that China has been pushing as it expands its economic base in Africa.Standard Bank will gain access to the world's fastest-growing economy, boost its capital base and its ability to finance trade flows between Africa and Asia, Standard Bank chief executive officer Jacko Maree said.China's relentless investment offensive in Africa has been welcomed by impoverished countries. But it has drawn fire from Western nations and aid groups, who accuse Beijing of turning a blind eye to misrule, corruption and human rights abuses.China argues it is spreading prosperity in the world's poorest continent where the West has failed."Their engagement with Africa is not dominated by this discussion of how to transform the continent. They are willing to deal with Africa on its own terms and that has been very successful for them," said Chris Alden, director of the China in Africa research project at SAIIA.
Pump cash, avoid politics
China's tactics in Africa have been straightforward: hotly pursue commercial deals and try to avoid politics.It has demonstrated skills in manoeuvring around political minefields in countries such as Sudan, where critics allege its military aid and oil investment has fuelled the Darfur conflict.Investing has proven risky on the ground. Rebels in Ethiopia killed nine Chinese workers in a raid on an oil installation in April.A Darfur rebel group which said it attacked Sudan's Defra oil field on Tuesday - killing 20 government soldiers and taking two foreign hostages - described the assault as a message to China. Sudan's government denied any such attack, though China's embassy in Khartoum confirmed it.China's CNPC has the biggest stake in the group that runs the field, alongside India's ONGC.But a steady flow of big deals since President Hu Jintao announced a drive to boost relations with Africa in 2004 suggests rewards may outweigh risks in the foreseeable future.
'Why should China not be good for Africa?'
Chinese loans, donations and debt relief have been made along the way.Some African government officials wonder why countries like the United States invest in China while questioning the country's record in Africa."The Chinese investments are not tied to too much (political or economic) analysis compared with the West, they move quickly," Zambian Commerce and Trade Minister Felix Mutati told Reuters."If China is good for the West, why should it not be good for Africa? We want to harvest the same benefits the West is getting from China," he said.Lack of transparency from Beijing on details of its investments and aid in Africa has also alarmed Western donors, who have watched China become a player in countries such as oil-rich Angola, where Chinese credit is believed to be between $4bn and $11bn."Angolans will probably generally like it. It helps to a degree to alleviate the international pressure regarding the Angolan government arranging its finance facilities from China," said a banker in the Angolan capital Luanda."After all, if the scion of South African banking in sub-Saharan Africa takes on a major Chinese bank as 20% investor, that sort of gives the good housekeeping seal of approval to the Chinese in Africa."

http://www.news24.com/News24/Africa/News/0,,2-11-1447_2210058,00.html

As in the days of Noah....

END TIMES WEATHER:30 dead in DRC floods

Kinshasa - Flooding in the Democratic Republic of Congo's capital left at least 30 people dead after rivers overflowed from heavy overnight rain that caused landslides and brought down bridges, officials said on Friday."Thirty dead and about a hundred injured have been registered," said Serge Mulumba, an official at Congo's Humanitarian Affairs ministry. Mulumba said the death toll was likely to rise as relief workers had not been able to get into houses in many flooded neighbourhoods.The rains started falling on Thursday and continued into early Friday."The rain led to landslides, and the overflowing of rivers. Even bridges have given way," said Communications Minister Toussaint Tshilombo Send.At least one bridge in the west of the city was impassable on Friday, making evacuation difficult from some neighbourhoods.Regions outside the capital had already been hit by heavy rain and flooding for three days. More than 200 homes were flooded in the village of Kisenge in central Katanga province, according to territorial administrator Kaumba Kabwebu.The Congolese Red Cross said flooding throughout the country has affected about 10 500 people.Prime Minister Antoine Gizenga said he is organising a crisis committee to deal with the disaster.A particularly heavy rainy season has flooded croplands and homes across central Africa in recent months.Since June, floods have killed at least 200 people and displaced hundreds of thousands in 17 countries, including Burkina Faso, Ghana and Togo in the west, and Sudan, Uganda and Kenya in central and eastern Africa.

http://www.news24.com/News24/Africa/News/0,,2-11-1447_2210194,00.html

As in the days of Noah....

Million-man march a flop

Harare - Thousands of supporters of Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe gathered at his party's headquarters in Harare on Friday in what may have been a failed attempt to stage a million-man march, reports said.War veterans said earlier this month they were planning to hold a million-man march in support of the veteran leader, who plans to stand for a fourth term in office in elections next year.Although no date for the march was publicly announced, reports on independent Zimbabwe news websites suggested it had been set for Friday.In a late-night news bulletin, official state television said the number of people gathered for Friday's march by far outnumbered those who had gathered for previous demonstrations in solidarity with the 83-year-old president.The sheer number of people who turned up forced organisers to abandon the plan to march through the central business district because it would have disrupted traffic and brought business to a standstill, the report said.Footage of the gathering showed crowds, but nowhere near a million people.

http://www.news24.com/News24/Africa/Zimbabwe/0,,2-11-1662_2210198,00.html

As in the days of Noah...

THOSE WHO PRACTICE RIGHTEOUSNESS.....

"Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin:for his seed remaineth in him:and he cannot sin,because he is born of God.
In this the children of God are manifest,and the children of the devil:whosoever doth not righteousness is not of God,neither he that loveth not his brother.
For this is the message that ye heard from the beginning,that we should love one another."
1 JOHN 3:9-11

Bush and Rice at Odds on Annapolis and Israel Attack on Syria

For the first time since they began working together, President George W. Bush and his secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice are visibly divided on two major foreign policy issues, both related to Israel: The Middle East peace conference in Annapolis, which is still sans date, participants or agenda, and Israel’s attack on the North Korean nuclear project in Syria on Sept. 6, which the president approved. As she feared, the resulting exposure of North Korea’s proliferation activities stirred a hornets’ nest against her bid to bring diplomacy on Pyongyang’s nuclear program to a successful conclusion with signed US-North Korean contracts for its liquidation. DEBKAfile’s Washington sources disclose that this week Bush questioned Rice on the prospects of the Annapolis meeting. “Can you do it?” he asked. “I’m trying,” she replied, thereby acknowledging it was far from being in the bag. The president was already skeptical, but he cooled further to the conference plan, those sources report, after listening to two American-Jewish delegations who visited the White House last week.Both voiced concern about Rice’s Middle East policies and the goals she was setting for the conference. They stressed that her expectations of the Palestinians were not only unrealistic but beginning to pose a threat to Israel’s national security.Bush assured the delegations that he would not let the conference descend into a platform for anti-Israel resolutions that prejudiced Israel’s security.The reason why Secretary Rice has so far not sent out invitations to the event, which was originally scheduled for late November, is that the State Department is still at sea over the Arab participants and their ranks. A question mark hangs over Saudi attendance, although Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak passed a message on to Rice when she visited Cairo earlier this month that Riyadh had no interest in the Annapolis event. He told her that if the Saudis stayed away, so too would most other Arab and Muslim governments.As for the North Korean issue, many circles in the Republican Party and the administration itself are critical of the heavy blanket of secrecy US officials have cast over the nature of the Israeli attack against Syria last month. They are accused of feeding information to the press for the purpose of shaping this story in such a way as not to impede the finalization of US-North Korean contacts. The magnitude and importance of Pyongyang’s nuclear assistance to Syria, which directly contravenes the substance of those contracts, are carefully glossed over.The more information emerging on the Israeli operation, the stronger the arguments for not signing accords with Pyongyang, they say, and cite two new revelations in particular:
1. It now transpires, according to DEBKAfile’s military sources, that there was not one Israeli operation in Syria but two: One targeted the unfinished nuclear reactors at At Tibnah east of the Euphrates River and the other, a military site. North Korea was involved deeply in both these Syrian projects - and not only the nuclear reactor.
2. The critics of Rice’s policies, some of whom administration officials briefed on the Israeli operations in Syria against a pledge of confidentiality, are suggesting that Syria had at least one other active partner as well as North Korea and Iran in its nuclear program.
It is not clear at this time how far the president means to go towards bringing the North Korea issue to a close; or how much he is influenced by the revelations tumbling out on Pyongyang’s contraventions and the mounting disapproval in his party and administration.
The Secretary of State’s most extreme antagonists go so far as to accuse her of putting her personal ambition to pull off diplomatic feats ahead of America’s national security interests.
Some sources in the Middle East ascribe her intense drive for a conference in Annapolis to the same motive.

http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=1310

As in the days of Noah.....

Putin spurns US European missile compromise, rejects tough stance on Iran

At the Russian-EU summit in Portugal Friday, Oct. 26, the Russian president Vladimir Putin likened the US proposal to build a missile defense shield in Eastern Europe to the Cuban missile crisis of the 1960s. “Such a threat is being set up on our borders,” he said, but admitted tension was much lower now than then and the US was listening to Moscow’s concerns.On arrival in Portugal, Putin compared the supporters of tough policies against Iran to "mad people wielding razor blades." On Kosovo's future, he questioned the wisdom of “encouraging separatism in Europe.”Earlier, US defense secretary Robert Gates said the US has done as much as it can “to appease Russia” on its missile plans. “We’ve leaned about as far forward as we can.” This week, the defense secretary offered to open the proposed sites in Poland and the Czech Republic to Russian observers and delay switching on the interceptors until the Washington and Moscow agreed on proof of a threat from Iran.“We are not satisfied with any of their proposals,” Russian defense minister Anatoly Serdyukov commented Thursday.Regarding his future, Putin said he would not assume presidential powers if he became prime minister after finishing his term in the spring."There will be no infringement on the powers of the president of the Russian Federation, at least while it depends on me,” he declared.

http://www.debka.com/headline.php?hid=4714

As in the days of Noah....

Clear Evidence Implicates Assad Personally in North Korean Nuclear Deal

President Bashar Assad was personally involved in Damascus’ nuclear deal with Pyongyang. Documentary proofs of this, obtained from the presidential bureau and signed by Assad in person, are now in the hands of the US and Israeli intelligence services, DEBKAfile’s intelligence sources report. In one, Assad hands down a specific order in his own handwriting that North Korea not be charged for Syrian goods, including an annual shipment of 100,000 tons of Durham wheat for five years worth a total of $120 million. This is the equivalent of the value of the reactor for producing plutonium up to its most radioactive stage, which North Korea promised Syria.A high-ranking Western intelligence source speaking to DEBKAfile described the evidence against Assad in US and Israeli hands as solid and much closer to a smoking gun than the West has turned up against Iran’s nuclear program.The following sequence of events unfolds from the garnered documents:
Damascus and Pyongyang settled between them that the nuclear transaction would be masked as a joint venture to build a cement factory in northern Syria; meanwhile, North Korea would sell Syria cement for its development projects.According to DEBKAfile’s sources, North Korean freighters, which began putting in at Syria’s Latakia and Tartus ports in January 2007, unloaded cargoes of cement in which nuclear reactor components and materials were concealed.
The North Korean traffic at these ports and the Durham wheat transaction attracted the attention of US and Israeli secret services.During the next eight months – up until the Israeli attack on Syria’s North Korean installation - wheat prices shot up on international markets. Indeed the price of Durham wheat doubled. Had this been a normal commercial transaction, Syria would have claimed additional North Korean goods in compensation. In fact, when import-export officials in Damascus, who knew nothing of the nuclear reactor tradeoff, pointed Assad’s office to the price fluctuations on the wheat market, they were told that the contracts signed by the president in person must go through without changes.When later, the Syrian wheat crop fell short of expectations, Syrian officials were again told to fill the North Korean orders in full.On Sept. 3, the North Korean “cement ship” Al Hamed docked at Tartus. The freight it unloaded was trucked directly to the “cement factory” at Al Tibnah in the Syrian Desert, east of the Euphrates River. The Israeli attack took place three days later.Last Tuesday, Oct. 23, the Syrian ambassador to Washington Imad Mustapha was invited to address the prestigious Institute on Religion and Public Policy. In answer to a question, he acknowledged, “Syria gives North Korea wheat, oil and other products.” He declined to disclose what Syria got in return. When pressed on this point, Mustapha said in exasperation: “Stuff. We get stuff.”Thursday, Oct. 25, a number of leading American media simultaneously ran satellite images of a nuclear installation standing at Al Tibnah in August 2007 and the same site in the second half of September, after it had been cleared of the debris left by the Israeli attack.This time, Damascus found nothing to say – although Syrian officials had commented on former leaks related to the episode. DEBKAfile’s Syrian sources report that this and other symptoms indicate that Assad finds himself in a tight corner. He is at a loss to explain to the Syrian public and, worse, to most of his colleagues in the political and military leadership who were kept ignorant of the nuclear transaction with North Korea, how he came to entangle the country in this ill-fated adventure.
In the view of DEBKAfile’s Western intelligence source, the Syrian president’s internal and international plight is more acute than that of the Iranian regime or Saddam Hussein in the days leading up to the 2003 US invasion. No incontrovertible proof has so far been shown to demonstrate that Iran has attained the capacity to produce nuclear or radioactive weapons, any more than the Iraqi ruler was positively shown to have weapons of mass destruction. Assad’s case is more unfortunate; it is now supported by solid evidence in American and Israeli hands.

http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=1311

As in the days of Noah....

Experts Warn Indonesia's 'Child of Krakatoa' Volcano Near Eruption

To read these news go to:

http://quakewatch.blogspot.com/2007/10/experts-warn-indonesias-child-of.html

As in the days of Noah...

Military Announces Successful Missile-Defense Test

WASHINGTON-The military shot down a Scud-type missile in another successful test of a new technology meant to knock down ballistic missiles in their final minute of flight, the Missile Defense Agency said Saturday.A ship off Kauai fired a target missile at 9:15 p.m. Hawaii Standard Time Friday, or 3:15 a.m. EDT Saturday. Minutes later, soldiers with the U.S. Army's 6th Air Defense Artillery Brigade launched an interceptor missile from Kauai that destroyed the target over the Pacific, according to the agency.The military says it already can shoot down missiles in their last stage of flight by using Patriot anti-missile batteries. The Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system would be able to protect larger areas than the Patriot system because it intercepts targets at a higher altitude.The new system had its first successful test last year at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico and two more successful tests earlier this year at the Pacific Missile Range Facility on Kauai.Saturday's announcement said the most recent test was the 31st "hit to kill" intercept in 39 tests since 2001 by ground and sea-based interceptors against short, medium and long-range ballistic missile targets.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,305685,00.html

As in the days of Noah....

PESTILENCE WATCH:Kentucky School District to Close 23 Schools After MRSA Staph Infection Reported

PIKEVILLE, Ky.-An eastern Kentucky school district with one confirmed case of antibiotic-resistant staph infection plans to shut down all 23 of its schools Monday, affecting about 10,300 students, to disinfect the facilities.The project will involve disinfecting classrooms, restrooms, cafeterias, hallways, locker rooms, buses and even external areas such as playgrounds and sports fields, said Roger Wagner, superintendent of Pike County schools."We're not closing schools because there's been a large number of breakouts, but as a preventive measure," Wagner said.One Pike County student was diagnosed with in September with MRSA, or "methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus." The bacterial strain can be treated with other antibiotics, but without treatment it can be deadly.The bacteria was blamed for the death of a 17-year-old Virginia high school senior this month. At least seven students on New York's Long Island were recently diagnosed with MRSA, as were 10 members of an athletic team at Iona College in New Rochelle, N.Y. However, a government report has estimated it may sicken more than 90,000 Americans each year.Two weeks ago, students staged a sit-in at the lunch room of Pike Central High School in effort to get school officials to clean the school as protection against the bacteria.Most abandoned the sit-in after Principal David Rowe threatened them with a three-day suspension, but 33 stayed and were given the choice of one day of in-school suspension or two days out-of-school suspension. Three chose out-of-school suspension.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,305677,00.html

As in the days of Noah....

U.S. Military: Iranian-Made Rockets Hit Base Near Baghdad

Rockets fired at a U.S. base southeast of Baghdad were manufactured in Iran, showing again that country’s continued logistical support for insurgents inside Iraq, U.S. military officials said on Saturday.Nobody was injured in the October 23rd attack on Combat Outpost Cashe, but one U.S. vehicle was damaged, officials said.According to the military, the 107mm rocket was made in Iran sometime in March. Troops investigating the launch site seized six rocket rails – used to aim and launch the rockets, an unfired rocket and a timing device.The seized rocket is the 40th Iranian manufactured rocket that soldiers have captured in the last four months, the military said.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,305686,00.html

As in the days of Noah...

US issues threats to Bosnian Serbs

US Ambassador to Bosnia, Charles English, has issued a threat to the democratically elected President of Serb entity in Bosnia insisting that the elected Serb lawmakers must accept laws international administrator is making otherwise American response on Bosnian Serbs will be "swift and powerful"."Conflict with the High Representative is the conflict with USA. The safety and stability of Bosnia Herzegovina is in the interest of United States and we are prepared to defend it," said English in an interview to Bosnian news agencies. "[I]f the path of the conflict continues, the reaction of United States will be swift and powerful," English warned Bosnian Serbs.The Slovak international administrator of Bosnia, Miroslav Lajcak, has enacted a law on October 19 that bans voting procedures established by the international peace treaty for Bosnia reached in 1995 in Dayton arguing that the Annex 10 of that agreement makes the administrator the final arbiter of any Bosnian laws and not the people who have elected lawmakers.As a result, the dominant Bosnian Serb party has threatened to leave the parliament while Serbia's Prime Minister stated that Belgrade will offer any and every support to the Bosnian Serbs seeking to preserve the spirit of the law of the Dayton Accords. Bosnian Muslims, who have long sought to abolish the Serb entity and establish Islamic domination over Serbs, have accused Serbian premier of meddling in Bosnia.Today, legal experts of the Bosnian Serb entity are scheduled to meet in Banja Luka to discuss the legal crisis international administrator has caused."A law can be made only by an organ legalized by the people," says Mile Dmicic, professor of constitutional law."The declaration High Representative made is a source of further legal, political, economic and other insecurity for the Serb Republic and its citizens," says Dmicic.

http://www.serbianna.com/news/2007/02801.shtml

As in the days of Noah....

THOSE WHO DISOBEY......

"Whosoever commiteth sin transgresseth also the law;for sin is the transgresssion of the law.
And ye know that he was manifested to take away our sins;and in him is no sin.
Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not:whosoever sinneth hath not seen him,neither know him.
Little children,let no man deceive you:he that doeth righteousness is reighteous,even as he is righteous.
He that committeth sin is of the devil;for the devil sinneth from the beginning.For this purpose the Son of God was manifested,that he might destroy the works of the devil."
1JOHN 3:4-8

ENVIRO WATCH:Heavy fog causes chaos in China

Thick fog in Beijing and other areas of northern China has reduced visibility to almost zero.Although it is now beginning to recede, the fog has forced the majority of domestic flights out of Beijing's Capital Airport to be delayed, leaving thousands of passengers stranded.A flight of the Airbus A380 super jumbo, which is on a demonstration tour of China, was also delayed.A spokeswoman for Beijing's meteorological office said the low visibility is due to fog lingering over the city because of light winds.The conditions have also highlighted a warning from the International Olympic Committee that some sporting events at next year's Summer Games in Beijing may have to be rescheduled due to poor air quality.The city's environmental bureau said in its daily report that the air quality is "slightly polluted" and heavily laden with matter. Vehicles and coal-powered boilers contribute to the amount of particulate matter in the air, as does dust from the numerous construction sites around the city.
To watch the video go to:
Heavy fog causes chaos in northern China
http://itn.co.uk/news/9e2f04633e16cd5011ad28886f9987e0.html
As in the days of Noah.....

Ukraine reburies 2,000 victims of Stalin's rule

BYKOVNYA, Ukraine-Ukraine on Saturday reburied some 2,000 people killed by the Soviet secret police before World War Two and dumped in mass graves near the capital.The 1,998 bodies, 474 of which were Poles, were dug up earlier this year in Bykovnya, a wooded area outside Kiev where Ukrainian officials believe some 30,000 people could have been buried during the 1930s and early 1940s.The mass graves were filled with people who were tortured and shot by the dreaded NKVD, a precursor to the KGB, during Stalin's rule in the run up to the war between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany.Others estimate up to 100,000 people were killed."I was 8 years old. It was just three of us, father, mother and me. And they took him," Maria Marzhetska said of her father, who was seized by the NKVD in 1937."Every morning, every evening we were at the police station," she said. She only found out his fate 60 years later.In a sombre ceremony attended by some 100 people, simple red coffins, some draped with flags, were lowered one by one into graves and blessed by a priest. Relatives and officials prayed by their side.Under Communist rule, the existence of mass graves filled with the victims of Stalin's rule was denied. It was only in the 1990s that it was acknowledged and a memorial was built.Polish historians and officials believe that several thousand Polish soldiers and officers who were captured as the Soviet Union encroached Polish lands to defeat the Nazis were buried there, including an estimated 15,000 massacred near the Katyn woods."This is a very important place for Poles because it is ... linked with Katyn," said Andrzej Przewoznik, general secretary of Poland's Council for the Protection of Monuments to Struggle and Martyrdom."This is a place where we would like the Polish (Catholic) cross and Polish memories of those people resting in the Bykovnya forest to be."

http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/international/ticker/detail/Ukraine_reburies_2_000_victims_of_Stalin_s_rule.html?siteSect=143&sid=8360143&cKey=1193505795000&ty=ti

As in the days of Noah.....

Turkey threatens incursion after Iraq talks fail

SIRNAK, Turkey-Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan threatened on Saturday to order an incursion into northern Iraq against Kurdish guerrillas after the failure of talks with Iraq aimed at averting a cross-border raid."The moment an operation is needed, we will take that step," Erdogan told a large flag-waving crowd in Izmit. "We don't need to ask anyone's permission."The talks collapsed late on Friday after Ankara rejected proposals by Iraqi Defence Minister General Abdel Qader Jassim for tackling guerrillas based in northern Iraq as insufficient and because they would not yield results quickly enough.Turkey has massed up to 100,000 troops, backed by fighter jets, helicopter gunships, tanks, and mortars, on the border for a possible offensive against about 3,000 rebels using Iraq as a base from which to carry out attacks in Turkey.The United States, which was also represented at the talks, opposes a major incursion, fearing it could destabilise the relatively peaceful north of Iraq and the wider region.The Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) launched its separatist campaign in 1984, since when more than 30,000 people have died.Erdogan took a swipe at western countries for not cracking down on the PKK and said calling it a terrorist group, as the United States and European Union do, was not enough."We want action, and if you can't show action, you fail the sincerity test," he said. "Those who overlook terrorism are in cooperation with terrorism," he told a conference earlier.Army sources told Reuters on Saturday that military planes were making reconnaissance flights along the mountainous border to photograph PKK camps in northern Iraq. Helicopters were patrolling villages and soldiers sweeping roads for mines.
"DETERMINATION TO FIGHT"
Erdogan played down comments by Turkey's armed forces chief General Yasar Buyukanit that the Turkish army, NATO's second largest, was waiting for him to meet U.S. President George W. Bush in Washington on November 5 before a major incursion.U.S.-Turkish ties have deteriorated sharply in recent weeks.Senior Turkish diplomats say Erdogan has given Washington and Baghdad a limited time to show concrete results or steps to be taken against the PKK. The meeting in Washington will be the last chance, they told Reuters.Any major offensive, expected to involve ground and air forces, would first have to be approved by the government."I don't know what will happen before the American trip," Erdogan said late on Friday.On Saturday Buyukanit, in a speech to mark Monday's Republic Day, said the army would fight until it had destroyed the PKK."We feel the pain of our martyred heroes deeply. But that pain increases our determination to fight," the text of his speech read. "Those who make us suffer cannot even imagine the suffering we will inflict on them; on this we are determined."
Ankara has threatened sanctions against Iraq and Foreign Minister Ali Babacan raised the possibility again on Saturday. He said the government would use political, diplomatic, economic, cultural and military "instruments" to fight the PKK."Which of these instruments will be used, to what extent and when is being determined in a general strategy," he told reporters as he left for an official visit to Iran.In the south-eastern city of Sirnak, about 1,000 people demonstrated against the PKK, which has killed some 40 people in the last month and, after its latest major attack, said it took eight soldiers prisoner."For every 12 martyrs, 12,000 more Turkish martyrs are born," chanted protesters, who came from all over the province that has Iraq as its neighbour.The military has carried out as many as 24 limited operations into northern Iraq against the PKK, Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek said on Friday. Helicopter gunships and F-16 jets have attacked rebel positions inside Iraq in recent days.Turkey had asked Iraq to hand over PKK leaders but the central government has little control over semi-autonomous northern Iraq, run by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).The KRG, led by Masoud Barzani, says it has no control over the PKK and Barzani has vowed to fight any Turkish incursion.

http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/international/ticker/detail/Turkey_threatens_incursion_after_Iraq_talks_fail.html?siteSect=143&sid=8310595&cKey=1193504913000&ty=ti

As in the days of Noah....

Israel gets 'Chinese' admiral

The Israel Navy's new commander is of Chinese descent, a first for the military top brass in the Jewish state. Admiral Eli Marom-nicknamed "Chiney"-took over as navy chief this month after his predecessor, David Ben-Bassat, quit amid criticism of his conduct during the Lebanon war.
Marom's mother was a member of the Chinese Jewish community, born to a local man and a Russian emigre woman. She married Marom's father after he fled his native Germany for China during World War Two. In 1955, the couple moved to Israel, where Marom was born. Marom's asiatic appearance may have helped him advance in the Israel Navy. "The fact that Chiney looked different forced him constantly to show that he was better. He became one of the very best very quickly," one former comrade told the weekend Yediot Acharonot, which ran a profile of the new admiral. Marom, 52, trained as an engineer and ascended through the ranks, overseeing major naval operations such as the 2002 capture of an Iranian-supplied weapons ship en route to Gaza.
http://www.jta.org/cgi-bin/iowa/breaking/104918.html
As in the days of Noah....

The cult of Israel-hatred

Tonight I decided to skip my usual Friday night services and head on down to the Old South Church to attend the opening of the Sabeel conference on “The Apartheid Paradigm in Palestine-Israel.” The church is a beautiful building; what a shame it was to see it defiled by such hatred. The pews were packed with people who dislike Israel in one way or another; one guy wore a t-shirt depicting a burning Israeli flag.I walked around the room to see where the microphones for question-and-answer would be. There weren’t any, and at the start of the evening we were told that if we wanted to ask a question we’d have to fill out an index card and hand it to one of the ushers. Screened in advance! I should have known. I complained to Phyllis Bennis, one of the moderators, who told me: “This is not an open discussion.” Indeed!I sat down in a pew near the front and opened the folder of conference materials. The back page of the official program was entitled “Apartheid?” and was filled with quotes and maps aimed at proving the Israel-apartheid analogy. They had a line from Jimmy Carter, a line from Archbishop Desmond Tutu (the conference’s keynote speaker), and a line from—no, wait, really?—Nelson Mandela:“Apartheid is a crime against humanity. Israel has deprived millions of Palestinians of their liberty and property. It has perpetuated a system of gross racial discrimination and inequality. It has systematically incarcerated and tortured thousands of Palestinians, contrary to the rules of international law. It has, in particular, waged a war against a civilian population, in particular children.”Sounds rather damning, doesn’t it? And who could disagree with Nelson Mandela? There’s only one problem: Nelson Mandela never said, wrote or endorsed those words. They are the creation of an Arab journalist named Arjan El Fassed. When I exposed El Fassed's fraud earlier this year, he claimed: “There is no possible basis for Pollak to say I intended people to believe the memo was written by anyone other than myself.”In spite of El Fassed’s admission, the Israel-haters continue to use his Mandela quote to promote their views. But El Fassed’s “Mandela Memo” is a fraud—just as much a lie as the Israel-apartheid equation itself. The entire evening was built on such lies. Keynote speaker Naim Ateek, for example, claimed that the Israeli government has an “intense desire to ethnically cleanse Palestinians.”But I’m jumping ahead. The evening began with an address by the Right Reverend M. Thomas Shaw, the local Episcopalian bishop, who equated the anti-Israel movement with the anti-apartheid movement: it is “like any movement we’ve had for justice in human history,” he said. “God smiles on this assembly,” he added. This was a feature throughout the evening: religious blessing of hatred against Israel. After a hymn—“Guide my feet, Lord” (out the door, I wanted to add)—Archbishop Tutu stood up and recited an invocation. “Lead us from prejudice to truth,” he prayed. Amen, I muttered. I flipped through the Bible in front of me and landed on an appropriate verse, Psalm 36:3: “The words of their mouths are mischief and deceit; they have ceased to act wisely and do good.”A Muslim cleric, Imam Mahdi Bray, then stood up and gave a silly speech about how he had personally experienced apartheid because he had grown up as a black American in the South and his house had been firebombed et cetera. He did not explain how that qualified him to speak about Israel, but nevertheless went on and on in fiery style about the rights of the dispersed Palestinian people. Next up was Sara Roy. She devoted most of her speech to attacking Jews, telling the audience that Jewish leaders exploit the Holocaust and other examples of Jewish suffering like the Inquisition. (?!?) She then went on at length about “my Holocaust background,” how her parents were survivors and lived through “loneliness and longing,” and how that formed her opinions of Israel. (Hello, exploitation?)Israelis and Jews, she said, are “racist,” aside from a few exceptions. Though Jews have a strong tradition of dissent, it is unacceptable among Jews to admit “that Palestinians share our humanity,” she said. Spoon-fed this slander from a person with an unimpeachable “Holocaust background,” the audience swallowed every word and rewarded her with a spirited burst of applause.Ateek was the last to speek, and was introduced by Hilary Rantisi, who claimed that the event organizers had come under pressure to “disinvite” him. She attacked his critics but did not attempt to explain his religious bigotry, reported recently by Jeff Jacoby in the Boston Globe (whose article was distributed with the conference materials, along with a defense of the event by a local reform Rabbi).Ateek said that he opposed violence on both sides, and supported a two-state solution and Israel’s right to live within the 1967 borders (which only a handful of people in the room applauded). However, he said that the government of Israel doesn’t listen and refuses to end the “evil” occupation. He then quoted a Ha’aretz article in which Israeli Jews themselves had used the word “apartheid.”He equated the Hebrew word hafradah (“separation”), used by some Israelis to describe the security barrier, with the Afrikaans apartheid. He claimed this was a sign that Israelis now support an apartheid policy. (What hafradah actually refers to is separation from land, not people—from the occupied territories, not from Arabs, who are more integrated into Israel now than ever before. Sigh.)There was a break, and after confirming that there were to be no questions from the floor, I decided to leave. Karl Popper once said that a theory is only scientific if it is falsifiable, i.e. if it is open to being disproved. In the same way, any political idea which is not open to challenge and debate cannot possibly be true. However, if you repeat it often enough, as the saying goes, people start to believe it.Fraudulent accusations against the Jewish state, based on fabricated evidence. Religious endorsement of hatred, couched in the rhetoric of social justice. False caricatures and stereotypes of an entire people. The parading of token Jews to verify everything said from the stage. Sound familiar? They used to have a word for that. But you can’t use “antisemitism” anymore. So I’ll just call it a disgrace.

by Joel Pollak

http://guidetotheperplexed.blogspot.com/2007/10/26-october-2007-cult-of-israel-hatred.html

As in the days of Noah....

Pakistan's Bhutto Visits Ancestral Home

GARHI KHUDA BAKSH, Pakistan-Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto went to her ancestral village Saturday amid tight security and sprinkled flower petals on her father's tomb on her first trip to provincial Pakistan since the bloody assassination attempt against her nine days ago.She vowed to fight Islamic extremism-a call that came as pro-Taliban militants in another corner of the country executed 13 captives in response to a military assault against their leader.Bhutto returned on Oct. 18 from an eight-year exile to a massive welcome rally in Karachi, shattered by a suicide bombing that killed 143 people. She has since been largely confined to her residence in that city, but eager to start her campaign for parliamentary elections slated for January. ''There is an attempt by the extremists and the terrorists to dictate who should be allowed to hold public meetings and who should not ... The agenda of the terrorists is to stop democratic parties from flourishing so they can continue to grow,'' Bhutto told journalists Saturday evening at her vast family compound.Pakistan has a choice between ''creeping Talibanization'' or standing up to save Pakistan, she said. ''I believe the message of Islam is peace, and I hope that together as a nation can work for peace.''Security was tight Saturday, but throngs of people still swarmed around Bhutto at her family's white-domed marble mausoleum in the village of Garhi Khuda Baksh.Wearing her trademark white headscarf, Bhutto smiled and waved to supporters from her SUV's sunroof with black metal sheets shielding her on the left and right, and a female aide standing in front of her. Her convoy was flanked by paramilitary troops in white pickup trucks with machine guns mounted on top. Other guards clung to the sides of the SUV.Hundreds of armed private security guards surrounded the mausoleum and formed a tight circle around the opposition leader as she got out of her vehicle, pushing their way through a chaotic fray of supporters and journalists.In the mausoleum she paid respects to her father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Pakistan's first popularly elected leader who was overthrown by the military and hanged in 1979. During her 45-minute visit, she said prayers and spread pink flower petals on his tomb and those of other relatives.She later went to a balcony and waved to about 2,000 supporters. Banners depicting Bhutto and her late father covered walls and hung from lamp posts.''I just wanted a glimpse of Bhutto from afar,'' said Ali Hassan, 52. ''It seems very beautiful that she has come here after being away so long.''Bhutto, whose two governments between 1988 and 1996 toppled amid allegations of mismanagement and massive corruption, came to Pakistan after talks with President Gen. Pervez Musharraf yielded an amnesty on pending graft cases against her. After elections, they could team up to fight Islamic extremism. Militant violence has become increasingly common, not just in the volatile frontier region bordering Afghanistan, but in major cities such Karachi and the capital, Islamabad.Bhutto says she is not intimidated by the Karachi attack. She has said she would visit Lahore and Islamabad, and also wants to go to Pakistan-controlled parts of Kashmir and remote areas along the Afghan border, where the Taliban and al-Qaida are tightening their grip.She has accused elements in the government and security services of trying to kill her, and demanded that international experts join the investigation-a call the government rejected.''Our investigators have solved all the cases of the past including those of Karachi, and I believe those involved in the Oct. 18 attack will also be arrested,'' Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz told reporters Saturday in Karachi.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Pakistan.html?ex=1351137600&en=50b8be4782b0818f&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

As in the days of Noah....

Clans Complicate Philippine Conflict

MANILA-Clan violence has aggravated the conflict between government forces and Islamic separatists in the southern Philippines, making the decade-long search for peace there even harder, a new study says.The study, released Wednesday by the Asia Foundation, said the peace process in Mindanao, the region in the southern Philippines where Islamic separatists have been fighting for self-determination since the 1970s, would have a better chance of succeeding if clan violence were addressed.The project’s researchers, who included Islamic scholars and anthropologists, found that in Mindanao from the 1930s to 2005, there had been 1,266 cases of clan violence-called “rido” by Filipino Muslims-in which 5,500 people were killed and thousands were displaced.While clan conflict is common in many societies, rido is an especially volatile force because it has, according to the study, “wider implications for conflict in Mindanao, primarily because it tends to interact in unfortunate ways with separatist conflict and other forms of armed violence.”The government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front have been negotiating for peace since 1997, but no substantial agreement has been reached.According to the study, half of the documented clan violence occurred between 2000 and 2004. During this period, the cease-fire between the government and the Islamic front was broken many times by clan fighting.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/world/asia/28filip.html?ex=1351224000&en=4b07c0900a9fa4bf&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

As in the days of Noah....

LOVE NOT THE WORLD.....

"Love not the world,neither the things that are in the world.If any man love the world,the love of the Father is not in him.
For all that is in the world,the lust of the flesh,and the lust of the eyes,and the pride of life,is not of the Father,but is of the world.
And the world passeth away,and the lust thereof:but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever."
1 JOHN 2:15-17

Iran's police target 'book-cafes'

Iranian police have ordered shut and sealed several Tehran bookshops which also provide coffee and snacks to readers, because of what one officer termed "a clash of professions." "Based on the (booksellers) union law, owners of one type of business are not allowed to practise two different professions at the same time," head of Tehran police information, Colonel Mehdi Ahmadi, told AFP on Saturday.According to the state IRNA news agency, six book-cafes have been sealed."It is not possible that they open a cafe-restaurant and give such services beyond their union's job description," Ahmadi said, referring to what have become known as "book-cafes" where people borrow books, relax with a coffee and read.But Farid Moradi of publishers Saales said many other businesses in Iran had coffee shops besides their primary profession. "Many other places such as cinemas, swimming pools and sports clubs have a space for people to hang out and drink coffee... it seems that they (the police) are adopting a different approach" for bookshops, Moradi said."We received a notice to close our book-cafe and we did so within the given deadline," Moradi told AFP, adding that they reported the closure to the union on Wednesday but that police still sealed the shop on Thursday.He said the four-year-old publishing company was now trying to have the seal removed.Alireza Elmi, director of Badragheh Javidan publishers, said that after they shut down their coffee operation they were able to reopen, but the process took two weeks."The person who had come to seal the bookshop responded to my objection by saying 'all the corruption in the country comes out of these book-cafes'," he was quoted by Sarmayeh newspaper as saying.Besides offering a pleasant atmosphere for book lovers, the book-cafes in Tehran also hosted cultural events.Since April, Iran has been pressing ahead with one of its toughest crackdowns in years, warning women about dressing immodestly, targeting "immoral" cafes and seizing illegal satellite dishes.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=071027193806.qqe91lz5&show_article=1&catnum=0

As in the days of Noah...

LAND FULL of VIOLENCE:At least three die in Colombia bombing before vote

BOGOTA-Two Colombian marines and at least one civilian were killed when guerrillas bombed a military patrol in the country's main Pacific port city less than two days before elections, authorities said on Saturday.Nine people were wounded in the blast on Friday night outside a restaurant in a poor neighborhood of Buenaventura, where guerrillas, paramilitaries and traffickers often battle for control of drug trade routes.The attack came before Sunday's vote for governors, mayors and local councils that analysts say will be a test of how far President Alvaro Uribe's U.S.-backed security policies have curbed the violence and political influence of armed groups."It was an explosive of more than 10 kilograms (22 pounds) ... set off by remote control," Marine Col. Hector Pachon told local radio.He blamed the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, the largest rebel group known as the FARC.Supported by billions of dollars in U.S. aid, Uribe has sent troops to drive back the FARC and retake areas under the sway of armed groups. Bombings and kidnappings from Latin America's longest-running guerrilla insurgency have eased.Colombia remains the world's largest producer of cocaine with most shipments ending up on U.S. and European streets.At least 21 candidates have been killed during the run-up to the elections. The government blames the FARC for most killings and says assassinations are down from a 2003 vote, but one election watchdog disputes the government figure and says the number of deaths has increased.The disputed figures may be because of differences over whether to include candidates who were killed before they could officially register their campaigns.Nearly 400,000 troops and police will take to the streets to ensure security during the election. Election observers say nearly half of Colombia's 1,100 municipalities face some form of election threat or violence.Helped by cocaine cash, the FARC remains potent in remote areas. Outlawed paramilitaries who once fought the FARC have now mostly demobilized under a peace deal with Uribe. But some have rearmed to form drug gangs.

http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSN2740815920071027?feedType=RSS&feedName=worldNews&rpc=22&sp=true

As in the days of Noah....

We must bomb Iran, says US Republican guru

A senior foreign policy adviser to the Republican frontrunner Rudy Giuliani has urged that Iran be bombed using cruise missiles and "bunker busters" to set back Teheran’s nuclear programme by at least five years.The tough message at a time of crisis between the United States and Iraq was delivered by Norman Podhoretz, one of the founders of neoconservatism, who has also imparted his stark advice personally to a receptive President George W. Bush. "None of the alternatives to military action - negotiations, sanctions, provoking an internal insurrection - can possibly work," said Mr Podhoretz."They’re all ways of evading the terrible choice we have to make which is to either let them get the bomb or to bomb them."In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Mr Podhoretz said he was certain that bombing raids could be successful."People I’ve talked to have no doubt we could set it back five or 10 years. There are those who believe we can get the underground facilities as well with these highly sophisticated bunker-busting munitions."Although Mr Podhoretz said he did not speak for Mr Giuliani, the former New York mayor whom he briefs daily appears to have embraced at least the logic of his hard-line views.During a visit to London last month, Mr Giuliani said Iran should be given "an absolute assurance that, if they get to the point that they are going to become a nuclear power, we will prevent them or we will set them back five or 10 years".Mr Podhoretz said: "I was very pleased to see him say that. I was even surprised he went that far. I’m sure some of his political people were telling him to go slow ... I wouldn’t advise any candidate to come out and say we have to bomb - it’s not a prudent thing to say at this stage of the campaign."But Mr Podhoretz’s 77 years and his position as a pre-eminent conservative foreign policy intellectual means he can not only think the unthinkable but say the unsayable."My role has simply been to say what I think," he said, explaining that he takes part in weekly conference calls and is in daily email contact with the Giuliani campaign.He is the most eminent of a clutch of uncompromisingly hawkish aides assembled by Mr Giuliani. They include Daniel Pipes, who opposes a Palestinian state and believes America should "inspire fear, not affection", and Michael Rubin, a former Pentagon official who has argued that Condoleezza Rice’s diplomacy is "dangerous" and signals American "weakness" to Teheran."Does Rudy agree with me?" Mr Podhoretz asked rhetorically. "I don’t know and I don’t wish to know." But he added that "Rudy’s view of the war is very similar to mine."Mr Podhoretz’s thesis is that the war on terror is in fact World War Four and that the 42-year-long Cold War should be more properly described as World War Three.Awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, America’s highest honour, by President George W. Bush in 2004, Mr Podhoretz later sought a rare one-on-on audience with the US commander-in-chief. They met in New York’s Waldorf Astoria hotel in the spring.The author of the recent World War IV: the Long Struggle Against Islamofacsism spent about 35 minutes outlining his case for air strikes against Iran as Mr Bush’s then chief adviser Karl Rove took notes."Whether I had any effect on him I truly don’t know but I sure tried my best to persuade him," he said."He was very cordial. He was warm. He listened. He occasionally asked a question as I made the case but he was truly poker faced."Mr Podhoretz left the meeting unshaken in his belief that Mr Bush would attack Iran before he leaves office."The spirit of the questions was not to try to refute or contradict what I was saying. I didn’t get any negative vibes."He said that now "the debate [over Iran] is secretly over and the people who are against military action are now preparing to make the case that we can live with an Iranian bomb".Neither Mr Bush nor Mr Giuliani, however, would countenance Teheran acquiring a nuclear weapon and either one would authorise military action once they were convinced Iran had passed the point of no return with its uranium enrichment programme."Unlike a ground invasion where you’ve got to mass hundreds of thousands of troops, it takes six months and everybody knows you’re mobilising, with air strikes, we’ve got three carriers in the region and a lot of submarines," Mr Podhoretz said."I would say it would take five minutes. You’d wake up one morning and the strikes would have been ordered and carried out during the night. All the president has to do is say go."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/10/27/wbomb127.xml

As in the days of Noah....

CULTURE of DEATH:$300 million in subsidies for abortionists challenged

Many of the nation's most influential Christian organizations, including Focus on the Family American Family Association, Concerned Women for America, the Catholic League and Eagle Forum, are asking Congress to suspend the estimated $300 million annual federal subsidy to abortion industry leader Planned Parenthood.A letter has been dispatched to all members of Congress citing the 107 pending criminal charges against Comprehensive Health of Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri, which alleged abortionists there not only provided illegal late-term abortions in violation of state law, but also failed to determine the viability of the babies before the abortions."Planned Parenthood operates around 860 facilities around the country, and there are approximately 40 states with laws banning late term abortions. This illegal conduct may be happening all over the country," the letter said. WND reported earlier on the charges against Planned Parenthood, charges for which Johnston Country District Judge James Vano found probable cause. "This is the first step in obtaining justice for the preborn children and finally putting abortions and the abortion cartel behind bars," said Troy Newman, of Operation Rescue. "This is vindication for the pro-life movement and all the work that pro-lifers have done throughout the years to expose the lies and criminal activities of the likes of Planned Parenthood."His organization has been lobbying for, and providing evidence about, criminal charges against abortionists for an extended period in Kansas. Operation Rescue also is part of an effort in Kansas to seat a grand jury to look into possible additional charges, since the pending criminal counts stem from only a few individual abortion cases in a single year.He said he expects other investigations in other jurisdictions now to result. "We're going to be demanding it," he told WND. "If you don't comport with national Planned Parenthood policies … you're not a Planned Parenthood.""The undersigned organizations request the immediate suspension of Planned Parenthood's federal funding until it can be determined whether the organization violated state and/or federal laws," the letter, sent to all members of the U.S. House and U.S. Senate this week, said."While Planned Parenthood claims that it does not perform late-term abortions after 22 weeks, the charges were reviewed by a Johnson County, Kansas district judge who found probable cause," the letter said."These are substantive charges levied against Planned Parenthood. States have passed laws on late-term abortions because they are detrimental to women as well as babies. Women are often not informed that late-term abortions increase the likelihood of severe blood loss, damage to vital organs, later premature births and loss of fertility."The counts were filed by Kansas District Attorney Phill Kline, who posted a statement he would not be commenting on the case.The corporation has been ordered to appear in court on Nov. 16, and if convicted on all counts could face more than $2.5 million in potential fines, officials said.WND attempts to obtain a comment from Planned Parenthood were unsuccessful.
To read more go to:
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=58376


As in the days of Noah....

Terrorists:Vote Hillary; Kill Rudy

Senator Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign is gaining fans, even on the West Bank.“I hope Hillary is elected in order to have the occasion to carry out all the promises she is giving regarding Iraq,” said Ala Senakreh, West Bank chief of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, a Palestinian terror group. “President Clinton wanted to give the Palestinians 98 percent of the West Bank territories. I hope Hillary will move a step forward and will give the Palestinians all their rights."Senakreh and other top Islamo-fascists want Hillary in the Oval Office. These mass murders also have “gone negative.” They want GOP contender Rudy Giuliani dead.“We see Hillary and other candidates are competing on who will withdraw from Iraq,” said Abu Jihad of Al Aqsa’s Nablus unit. “This is a moment of glory for the revolutionary movements in the Arab world…”Al Aqsa’s Nasser Abu Aziz, considered it “very good” that there are “voices like Hillary and others who are now attacking the Iraq invasion.”Islamic Jihad’s Abu Ayman felt “emboldened” by Clinton’s demands that America retreat from Iraq. He said: “It is clear that it is the resistance operations of the mujahideen that have brought about these calls for withdrawal.”“All Americans must vote Democrat,” insisted Jihad Jaara, an exiled Al Aqsa agent who commanded 2002’s siege of Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity.Since 1995, these terrorists’ organizations have killed an estimated 162 and wounded 368 others in Israel. Aaron Klein, an Orthodox Jew who is WorldNetDaily.com’s Jerusalem Bureau Chief, interviewed some three dozen leading Muslim fanatics, including those quoted here. His new book, “Schmoozing with Terrorists,” details these chilling encounters with violent Islamic extremists in Israel’s Palestinian territories.Why do these hardened butchers have a soft spot for Hillary Clinton? Perhaps because the New York Democrat is soft on terrorism.*Clinton rejects robustly interrogating terrorists even in “ticking time bomb” scenarios. In a September 26 Democratic debate, she said: “It cannot be American policy, period.” *Clinton opposes the U.S. Terrorist Surveillance Program, calling it “a secret program that spies on Americans.”*Clinton voted against military tribunals for terror suspects, including al-Qaeda detainees.*Clinton has zigzagged on Iraq. In autumn 2002, she voted for Operation Iraqi Freedom. Last January 18, she told PBS: “I think the timetable still remains problematic” for leaving Iraq. But on February 17, she stated: “It’s time to say the redeployment should start in 90 days…”Meanwhile, Clinton’s campaign has not responded to my request to list her counterterrorist accomplishments.These terrorists’ love for Hillary mirrors their hatred for her leading GOP rival, Rudy Giuliani.“If I had the occasion to meet him I would hurt him,” said Ramadan Adassi, a West Bank Al Aqsa leader. “For the sake of the American people, Giuliani shouldn’t be elected.”“Giuliani doesn’t deserve to live or even to be mentioned,” said Al Aqsa’s Ala Senakreh. “He hates Palestinians and we hate him.”Al Aqsa’s Abu Hamed said Giuliani “can hate Arafat and the Palestinians, but he knows that nobody is hated in the world more than his leadership, his party, his president, and his Zionist friends.”Why the hard feelings? Perhaps because Giuliani has snipped terrorists’ bomb wires for 31 years.*Mayor Giuliani’s NYPD officers in July 1997 arrested two Palestinians with Jordanian passports and five pipe-bombs. They were convicted of immigration fraud and plotting to blast Brooklyn’s Atlantic Avenue subway station.*As New York City’s U.S. Attorney, Giuliani attempted in 1988 to close the Palestine Liberation Organization’s United Nations observer mission under the 1987 Anti-Terrorism Act.*In 1986, Giuliani targeted an anti-Castro group responsible for two murders and 25 bombings. Giuliani secured guilty pleas from three Omega 7 members who conspired to kill Cuba’s U.N. ambassador in 1980 and blow up its Manhattan consulate in 1979.*Giuliani represented the Justice Department on President Gerald Ford’s Cabinet Committee to Combat Terrorism in 1976. “I don’t believe Americans should base their votes entirely on what the terrorists think,” Aaron Klein says from Jerusalem, “but it’s certainly telling that our enemies are rooting for the Democrats, particularly Hillary.”As the War on Terror continues, Americans should study our foes’ political preferences-and then pull the lever the other way.

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=23056

As in the days of Noah....