McCain Goes National, Hits Obama
http://newsmax.com/headlines/mccain_obama_security/2008/03/31/84463.html
Republican presidential candidate John McCain on Monday dismissed Democrat Barack Obama's charge that he wants a "100-year war" in Iraq and belittled Obama's level of national security experience.
McCain began a trip down memory lane in Mississippi, opening a tour to places where he grew from rebellious youth to war hero and politician. He was a Navy flight instructor in Meridian and the McCain airfield is named for his grandfather.
But he quickly got himself enmeshed in the politics of the day, responding to Obama's oft-repeated charge that McCain would leave the United States in Iraq for a century.
Obama had said earlier on Monday he did not think the charge was unfair, that McCain "has not been clear about what exactly would lead him to decide it's time to pull out."
McCain gave the Democrats an opening on the issue by using the 100-year description to describe how long the United States might need a presence in Iraq to help maintain regional stability.
But McCain said he was talking about something similar to the decades-old U.S. military presences in Japan, South Korea and Germany.
The Arizona senator, 71, said Obama, a senator from Illinois, "hasn't read or doesn't understand the history of this country," an experience-versus-youth theme likely to play out in the months leading to the November election if Obama defeats New York Sen. Hillary Clinton for the right to face McCain.
"In all due respect, he displays a fundamental misunderstanding of history, of how we maintain national security and what we need to do in the future to maintain our security. But I understand it because he has no experience or background in any of it," McCain told reporters on his campaign flight back to Washington.
McCain also said he was surprised by an offensive in southern Iraq by Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki because he had gotten no word that Maliki had consulted the Americans before launching it.
He said whether the mission can be deemed productive should be known in the next day or two. McCain expressed continuing annoyance at Iran, accusing Tehran of exporting weapons to Iraq and training Iraqi Shi'ite militias.
He said he believed Iran was still seeking to acquire the means to develop a nuclear weapon, although a recent National Intelligence Estimate had suggested otherwise.
MISSED 'MINI-SKIRT' PHASE
McCain said his past gave him a better understanding of the future, and that this is why he had embarked on a tour of places like Meridian. But he expressed some misgivings about his rebellious nature as a youth, saying young people should not do as he did, such as smoking and drinking to excess.
"Some of my behavior was very immature," he said.
But he said, because he was a Vietnam prisoner of war for 5-1/2 years, "I regretted that the mini-skirt phase came and went while I was away."
McCain will visit his high school outside Washington, D.C., on Tuesday and stop at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, where he graduated near the bottom of his class. He will also go to Florida and his home state of Arizona.
While reviewing his past, McCain came face-to-face with the present, riding on his bus in Meridian with Rachel Lee, whose son, Dustin Lee, a 20-year-old Marine raised in Stonewall, Mississippi, was killed in an explosion last year in Iraq's al-Anbar province.
McCain, a strong supporter of the U.S. troop build-up in Iraq, told Lee that the United States honored her son's sacrifice. McCain's wife, Cindy, wept as the woman told what happened to her son.
"We're without words to describe how much we appreciate it. I think we are winning the war -- we've had a problem here in the last few days, but hopefully the Anbar province will stay quiet -- thanks to the Marines and Army," McCain said.
Obama Wrong About His 'Kennedy Connection'
http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/Obama_Mistaken_Kennedy/2008/03/31/84319.html
In an address to civil rights activists in Selma, Ala., a year ago, Barack Obama credited the Kennedy family with enabling his Kenyan father to study in the U.S., where he met and married Obama’s mother.
But the Obama campaign has now admitted that Obama erred in crediting the Kennedys.
In fact, Barack Obama Sr. came to the U.S. in September 1959 in an airlift of 81 Kenyan students, while the Kennedy contribution to the program that brought him here was not made until the following year, the Washington Post disclosed. [Editor's Note: See the video of Barack Obama's speech where he made the mistake - Click Here Now.]
In his Selma speech — which he echoed in another address at American University in January — the Democratic presidential candidate said “folks in the White House” around President Kennedy wanted to “win hearts and minds all across the world.”
Said Obama: “So the Kennedys decided, ‘We’re going to do an airlift. We’re going to go to Africa and start bringing young Africans over to this country and give them scholarships to study so they can learn what a wonderful country America is.’
“This young man named Barack Obama got one of those tickets and came over to this country. He met this woman whose great-great-great-great-grandfather had owned slaves … So they got together and Barack Obama Jr. was born.”
The man who was actually responsible for the Kenyan airlift was Kenyan nationalist Tom Mboya, who came to the U.S. in 1959 and 1960 to raise money for the Kenyan study program.
At the time there was no university in Kenya, and the country was preparing for independence from Britain in 1963.
Mboya raised money from nearly 8,000 contributors, among them baseball star Jackie Robinson and actors Harry Belafonte and Sidney Poitier, according to the Post.
Obama Sr. was sent to the University of Hawaii. While in the state he met Kansas native Ann Dunham. They married, and Barack Jr. was born in August 1961.
Mboya did not approach the Kennedys until Obama was already studying in Hawaii. The Kennedy family contributed $100,000, and 256 more Kenyan students came to study in the U.S.
Obama also erred in his Selma speech when he mentioned the historic march in the Alabama city that marked a major milestone in the civil rights movement.
Discussing how his parents met, Obama said: “There was something stirring across the country because of what happened in Selma, Alabama, because some folks are willing to march across a bridge. So they got together and Barack Obama Junior was born. So don’t tell me I don’t have a claim on Selma, Alabama.”
In fact, the Selma march occurred four years after Obama’s birth.
Why Some Companies Are Warning Others About Doing Business With the Hillary Clinton Campaign
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,344148,00.html
Now some fresh pickings from the Political Grapevine:
Questionable Questionnaire
Barack Obama, it turns out, had a lot to do with a 1996 campaign questionnaire his campaign has since disavowed as the erroneous work of staffers.
On it, Obama — then running for the Illinois senate — took ultraliberal positions on abortion, the death penalty and gun control. His aides now say Obama never saw or approved the questionnaire.
But the Politico newspaper reports he was actually interviewed by the questionnaire's sponsors and even sent them an amended copy with his own handwritten notes on it. Current Obama aide Tommy Vietor concedes the notes were Obama’s, but still insists the form was filled out by staff and did not reflect the candidate's views.
Cash Strapped
There is further evidence that the Hillary Clinton campaign has hit hard times. According to the Federal Elections Commission, Clinton owes $8.7 million in unpaid bills — some dating back months.
A pair of Ohio companies are owed more than $25,000 each for staging Clinton campaign events and are warning other event producers to get cash up front when doing business with her. An employee of one of the companies told the Politico, "Senator Clinton talks about helping working families... but when it comes down to actually doing something that shows that she can back up her words with action, she fails."
The campaign says it is in the process of paying nearly $300,000 in overdue heath insurance premiums for its staff.
"Peace Has Come"
Remember the little Bosnian girl who read Clinton a poem during her 1996 visit to the country? Well, she says she is dismayed that the former first lady claimed to have dodged sniper fire that day.
Emina Bicakcic — now a 20-year-old student — told the New York Post, "I was surprised when I heard this... she was really listening. She was drinking in every word of my poem."
When asked if she feared any threat of violence that day Bicakcic said, "No. I was just excited. I wanted to look her in the eye and say 'thank you.'"
Bicakcic says she was reluctant to criticize Clinton because of the deep appreciation for the U.S. role in ending the violence in Bosnia. Ironically, her poem to Clinton began with the words "peace has come."
Ruffled Reporter
Former "Nightline" reporter David Marash has quit Al Jazeera English saying that his exit is due to a "reflexive adversarial editorial stance" against Americans at the channel.
Marash left the English-speaking wing of Al Jazeera on March 21 and his wife Amy left the week before. He said of the bias, "given the global feelings about the Bush administration, it's not surprising," but that he found it "became so stereotypical."
Marash — who is Jewish — says he was warned that he was being used as a propaganda tool. But he said, "I don't think anti-Semitism is a charge that Al Jazeera English should plead guilty to." Instead he says the problem "was more with my American accent and my American point of view."
Rice: Israel I'm watching you
http://www.jnewswire.com/article/2400
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice wrapped up a two day visit to Israel and the Middle East Monday, but warned the Israelis that she will be monitoring them even more closely to ensure that they carry out their obligations under the Annapolis agreement.
Her visit - the third this year - was aimed at tightening the screws on Israel in order to be able to nail down a framework agreement by May 14 for the establishment of a Palestinian state on historical Jewish land.
US President George W. Bush is scheduled to be in Israel on that date, which marks - on the Gregorian calendar - the 60th anniversary of Israel's Declaration of Independence.
For the American administration, the dates appear to be part of the strategy. The Annapolis Conference was held on the 60th anniversary of the United Nations vote partitioning Palestine between Jews and Arabs.
At that event, under intense pressure from host Bush, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert agreed to set November 4 this year as a deadline for reaching a final agreement with PLO Chief Mahmoud Abbas and his Palestinian Authority.
And Bush said Sunday, according to the German newspaper Die Welt: "I hope that President Abbas and Prime Minister Olmert can sign an agreement before the end of my presidency [in January] that defines a clearly-outlined Palestinian state."
While Rice claimed, upon her arrival here Saturday night, she had not come to insert American demands - this is really an all-American show and one with which Israel is expected to cooperate, especially as Bush has tied his political prestige to achieving substantial results in the effort to give the Palestinian Arabs a state on land belonging to Israel.
Diplomatic reporters noted that Rice has not held back from "scolding" Israel's political leaders for "not doing enough" to ease life for the Arabs. A focal point of her visit this time was purportedly to try ease the movement of Arabs in Judea and Samaria.
Restrictions on their movement have come about as a result of the "Palestinian" civilians harboring terrorists and terrorists using the civilian population as a human shield.
Reported The Jerusalem Post Monday, Barak "learned his lesson from the last Rice visit, when she scolded him for not doing enough to ease the conditions of the Palestinians."
This time he had come to their meeting with a lengthy document, in English, outlining the steps Israel would take.
Rice said, first to Barak and later to foreign journalists, that she planned on more vigilantly monitoring Israel's implementation of its commitments "than she had been in the past."
Despite Israeli promises to remove roadblocks in Samaria and Judea, the number of roadblocks had actually increased since Annapolis, she complained.
Now, however, the US was going to make sure that Israel complied.
"We've been told this is going to start and even be completed in a relatively short period of time. I'm not going to give you a date but I'm expecting it to happen very, very soon," the secretary said.
Ms Rice: God is watching YOU
http://www.stangoodenough.com/?p=126
Dear Secretary Rice
As I write this, you are making your way back home after spending two days throwing your weight around in Israel, my adopted homeland.
Yes, I know it’s your job as Secretary of State; you have a president to please. You speak for the world’s number one superpower. And of course you have your reputation to think of and your destiny to fulfill.
I know, too, that you will never read this, and it is doubtful that anyone near you will either. Unlike you, I do not have any earthly power; people will obviously not hang onto my every word, circulating and commenting on what I say.
But that’s okay. I’m going to write you anyway. Because just as you are obligated (unless you want to lose your post) to represent and communicate the position of your boss, I am obligated to represent and communicate the position of mine. I can choose to ignore what you say, and you can choose to ignore what I say. The choice to speak out, and to take heed, is always ours.
All Christians who believe the Bible and strive to live by it are responsible for conveying its truths. We have a calling, a duty, a responsibility; and a day is coming when we will have to give an account.
I therefore feel bound to tell you, Madam Secretary, that ever since you set your sights on implementing the two-state vision that aims to create an Arab state on biblically and historically Jewish land, you have been playing with fire; potentially with eternal fire, and not just with your own life, but with the life and future of your nation.
You need to know this.
I know you go to church and I assume you read the Book of books. If so, you may remember the account in the 21st chapter of 1 Chronicles, where David, a God-appointed king, saw tens of thousands of his own subjects die as a direct result of his deliberate decision to ignore the Lord’s injunction not to take a census in Israel.
As Israelites were dropping like flies around him, David cried out to God saying: “Was it not I who commanded the people to be numbered? I am the one who has sinned and done evil indeed; but these sheep, what have they done?”
A man after God’s own heart, he had the moral courage to add: “Let Your hand, I pray, O LORD my God, be against me and my father’s house, but not against Your people that they should be plagued.”
Ms. Rice, like David, you and your president have been raised to your positions by that same God. It is He who “removes kings and raises up kings” (Daniel 2:21).
At the same time there was a national responsibility and a national consequence. The Israelites asked for a king and got David. Americans voted for a president and they got Mr Bush, who appointed you. Just as the Israelites were subject to David’s authority, Americans are subject to the authority represented by the White House and its administration.
What I want to convey in the strongest possible terms is this: Just as the Israelites bore the consequences of the actions of their leaders, your American people are bearing the consequences of your actions, particularly your actions in the Middle East, into which the Bush administration was drawn against its will, but which it has now made its top priority as its time in office runs out.
“I hope that President Abbas and Prime Minister Olmert can sign an agreement before the end of my presidency [in January] that defines a clearly-outlined Palestinian state,” the German daily Die Welt quoted Bush as saying yesterday.
And, speaking on the same day here in Jerusalem, you let Israel know that you “intend to be much more systematic about what is being promised and what is being done” by Israel to facilitate this. You are “expecting it to happen very very soon.”
Then, in Amman, Jordan this morning, standing next to veteran terrorist leader Mahmoud Abbas - who used violence against civilians to generate support like yours for his “cause” - you denounced Israel for settling Jews in Samaria and Judea.
“We continue to state America’s position that settlement activity should stop, that its expansion should stop – that is indeed not consistent with Road Map obligations,” you said.
That’s a good solid biblical word, “settlements.” If I may, I’d like to draw your attention to two more Bible verses:
In Isaiah 14:1 it says: “For the LORD will have mercy on Jacob, and will still choose Israel, and SETTLE them in their own land” [emphasis mine].
And through Ezekiel in chapter 34, God says: “And I will bring them out from the peoples and gather them from the countries, and will bring them to their own land; I will feed them on THE MOUNTAINS OF ISRAEL, in the valleys and in all the inhabited places of the country. I will feed them in good pasture, and their fold shall be on THE HIGH MOUNTAINS OF ISRAEL. There they shall lie down in a good fold and feed in rich pasture on THE MOUNTAINS OF ISRAEL” [emphasis again mine].
Do you see the phrase “the mountains of Israel?” Do you know where these are? The mountains of Israel are Judea, Samaria and the Golan Heights, the very parts of the Land of Israel you are working to sever from Jewish “occupation.”
Occupation? It is THEIR God-given land; it has never been the “Palestinians!’”
Bottom line: It is not the Israeli government that is behind the settlement activity in Judea and Samaria. It’s the LORD God Himself.
Moving on, I was interested to read that, while you planned to give Israeli opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu just 15 minutes of your time on this visit here- an expected courtesy perhaps - what he had to tell you, as he spoke of the dire consequences of giving Judea and Samaria to the Arabs, compelled you to spend at least an hour with him.
“I brought her information from security officials and intelligence indicating that Hamas could take over the West Bank and create what is essentially an Iranian base there,” Netanyahu told reporters after that meeting.
In other words you can never say that you were not warned - and not for the first time - of the very probable outcome of what you are forcing Israel to do.
I say forcing, because it is what you are doing; and you are building on what Israel has been forced to do - through diplomatic blackmail and not-always-so-veiled threats - by the presidents and secretaries of state that have preceded you.
With respect, your argument that the US is only doing what Israel’s governments are in agreement about doing is deceptive. The overwhelming majority of those in Israel who today go along with land-for-peace and the creation of Palestine ONLY do so because they have been pushed and pressured by America for decades to do so.
The buck for this stops in the Oval Office - and at Foggy Bottom. And please don’t protest about all the good things America has done for Israel - your “friend” and “ally” in the Middle East. There is little that is laudable about giving support to someone while aiding his enemies in their efforts to kill him.
I come back to what I said about the consequences of your actions to your nation.
As you are flying home, Madam Secretary, the Fox Extreme Weather Center is reporting multiple tornado warnings and unrelenting flooding hitting great swathes of your country.
The weather, which has been excessive for weeks on end, with “freak tornadoes” brought about by “record-breaking warm winter weather” rampaging through towns and cities - is today being described as “brutal.”
Here in Israel we are watching pictures of destroyed homes in Oklahoma City and other parts of what the forecasters call “America’s heartland” and more damage is reportedly on the way.
“The weather is training through this region, storm after storm, flashflood warnings, six to eight inches of snow, and a possible uncontrollable tornado breakout lashing the country tomorrow.” Instead of March “roaring in like a lion and going out like a lamb,” said Fox, the month was roaring out an even bigger lion than it came in.
And the second story topping the news? The most sweeping regulatory power being brought into play by the Treasury in America since the Great Depression.
I don’t need to tell you about what has happened to your dollar; what your people are now paying for gas. How Vice President Dick Cheney had to go to Saudi Arabia, cap in hand, and ask for a favor to keep that price-per-barrel from going out of control.
Bible believers read that God will require at America’s hand, and at the hands of all those nations who participate in this process, an answer for its dividing up of the Land of Israel and the scattering of its people.
Ms. Rice, I know it will require a superhuman ability you likely do not have within yourself. But for the sake of your nation and for the sake of your ultimate legacy, it is my deep and earnest hope that you will recognize the error of the way in which you are set, and turn from this path before it is too late.
Yours, as a lover of Zion and a lover of the United States
Stan Goodenough - a Jerusalem Watchman
Israel Announces Plans for 1,400 New West Bank Homes
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,343771,00.html
JERUSALEM — Israel announced plans Monday for 1,400 new homes on land the Palestinians claim for a future state — just hours after U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice ended a peacekeeping mission to the region.
Jerusalem's city hall announced it would build 600 new apartments in Pisgat Zeev, a Jewish neighborhood in the eastern sector of the city. Soon after, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish party said Prime Minister Ehud Olmert promised to build 800 additional homes in one of Israel's largest West Bank settlements, Betar Illit.
Palestinian officials weren't immediately available for comment.
Past Israeli construction projects in the disputed areas have sparked a series of crises in the peace negotiations, provoking the Palestinians at one point to suspend talks.
Rice said at a news conference with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, however, that talks were moving the sides toward the goal of some sort of peace agreement by 2009 that would lead toward the creation of a Palestinian state.
"I think it's all moving in the right direction," Rice said."I fully believe it is a goal we can reach."
But Rice criticized Israel's continued approval of new housing in contested territory.
"Settlement activity should stop - expansion should stop," Rice said.
Olmert spokesman Mark Regev had no comment on the new construction plans. But earlier in the day, Olmert pledged that Israel would build in east Jerusalem and heavily Jewish areas of the West Bank — land Israel expects to keep in a final peace agreement.
The ultra-Orthodox Shas party is a powerful partner in Olmert's coalition and Olmert needs to keep the hawkish party from bolting to hold on to power. Without Shas, he would lose his parliamentary majority.
Olmert insisted the building would not disrupt peace negotiations.
"This is going on within the framework of negotiations, and the negotiations will continue to progress," he said.
At a U.S.-hosted peace conference in November, Israel and the Palestinians agreed to relaunch long-stalled talks and base negotiations on the 2003 "road map" peace plan. The U.S.-backed proposal calls on Israel to freeze all settlement activity, including in existing settlements.
Because it annexed east Jerusalem after the 1967 war, Israel does not consider construction there to be settlement activity. The Palestinians and the international community do.
Israel also maintains the right to build in West Bank settlements to account for "natural growth" of the population there, even though the road map specifically bans such activity.
Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupolianski said he was confident that "following the prime minister's statement that construction in Jerusalem neighborhoods will continue, the government will not impose any delay on this plan."
A spokesman for Shas, Roi Lachmanovitch said Olmert promised to revive frozen plans to build 800 homes in Beitar Illit.
"There are more on the way," he added.
Monday's announcements followed a report by an Israeli watchdog group that Israel has approved the construction of almost 1,700 homes in contested territories since the peace talks were relaunched in Annapolis, Maryland, last fall.
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said officials presented information on Israeli settlement activity to Rice.
"President Abbas told Rice this is the most dangerous obstacle to peace," he said.
Also Monday, Israel began taking down some of the 50 West Bank roadblocks it pledged to remove during Rice's visit. Israel maintains more than 500 checkpoints and roadblocks, saying they are necessary security measures. The Palestinians say the travel restrictions are excessive and have crushed their economy.
Israeli defense officials said the Rimonim checkpoint near Ramallah, the seat of Abbas' government, had already been taken down.
A Palestinian who tried to stab Israeli hitchhikers near a West Bank Jewish settlement was shot and killed by one of them, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said, calling the shooting self-defense.
Hamas: 'We'll Only Attack Military'
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/348394.aspx
JERUSALEM, Israel - Exiled Hamas chief Khaled Mashaal has offered Israel a "reciprocal" deal: to attack only military targets.
The Damascus-based terror chief told Sky News Monday that it's the same deal his organization offered Israel 10 years ago.
"We renew our offer to Israel to let the civilians on both sides not be a part of this conflict," Mashaal said. "We renew this offer today," he repeated.
Mashaal neglected to mention that most of the Hamas rocket-launching pads, explosives manufacturing labs, and munitions warehouses are located in residential areas.
Neither Hamas' strategy nor its methodology has changed over the years. Though better armed and trained, it still launches attacks from civilian areas and use every opportunity to present itself as the victim of Israeli aggression.
"We have primitive weapons. I ask the international community and the Americans to give us more advanced weapons so we can shoot more accurately," Mashaal told Sky News.
Commenting on the Nazi Holocaust, Mashaal said that while he didn't deny it happened, he believes Zionists have exaggerated the numbers to promote their causes.
"We don't deny the Holocaust, but we believe the Holocaust was exaggerated by the Zionist movement to whip people," he said. "We don't deny the fact, but we don't accept two issues. We don't accept the exaggerating of numbers and we don't accept that Israel doesn't use this to do what it wants," he said.
Mashaal also claimed that kidnapped Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldier Gilad Shalit is alive and well.
Shalit was captured on June 25, 2005, in a cross-border attack at an IDF outpost near the Gaza Strip in which two soldiers were killed and three injured.
"Gilad is still alive and we treat him in a good way, while the Israelis treat our prisoners badly and everyone knows that," Mashaal said.
"Gilad Shalit is an internee who was taken by our military. He was fighting us while the majority of the Palestinian prisoners are civilians from the Palestinian parliament. They are civilian and political leaders, not military leaders," he claimed.
Mashaal said suicide bombings were a response to Israeli actions.
"We do not brainwash anyone. Every Palestinian spontaneously feels that his land is occupied, that Israel is killing children and women, demolishing their homes, taking their land, building the wall, building the settlements, and journalism favors Israel and digging under the al-Aksa Mosque [on the Temple Mount], so the Palestinian individual finds himself going directly to fight for the resistance," Mashaal said.
The Mystery of the Copper Scroll
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/347306.aspx
JERUSALEM, Israel - In 1947, a Bedouin shepherd wandered the hills of Qumran in search of a missing sheep.
He threw a stone into a cave, hoping to drive the lost animal outside. Instead, the sound of shattered pottery drew the shepherd inside the cave.
There he stumbled on the greatest archaeological find of the 20th century: the Dead Sea Scrolls.
In the years that followed, archaeologists found eleven caves and more than 900 documents here at Qumran. But one scroll was different from all the rest.
Instead of leather or parchment, it was made entirely of copper, and it could be the greatest treasure map in history.
The Copper Scroll describes a hidden cache of gold and silver buried in more than 60 locations throughout Israel.
The monetary value is close to $3 billion, but the historical value - is priceless.
The only place in ancient Israel with that much wealth was the Jewish Temple.
Stephen Pfann is one of the editors of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
"This is a tremendous witness to history. To actually have a list of treasures from the temple itself from the first century is just amazing. We have nothing better than the Copper Scroll now for telling us what was really there," Pfann, one of the editors of the Dead Sea Scrolls said.
Pfann took CBN News' Chris Mitchell up to cave number 3 at Qumra, where the Copper Scroll was hidden for nearly 2,000 years.
"You can actually see the place where the Copper Scroll was found," Pfann said.
The Purpose of the Scroll
"Well, the copper scroll had to be written just immediately before the destruction of the temple," Pfann explained.
"It actually fits the glove perfectly for these people known as the Zealots, who were the priestly group, who were holding down the temple, who were keeping it from the Romans in the best way possible. Before they were massacred, they left things behind in caves here in Qumran," he said
Some of their hiding places are easy to find on a modern map like Jericho, the Valley of Achor, and Mount Gerizim.
Others are more cryptic like "Solomon's Canal," which contains a stash of silver coins, a well in Milham where garments for the high priest were hidden, or Matia's Courtyard, where more than 600 gold and silver temple vessels were buried.
"The instruction on the scroll is like a kids' treasure map in a way; They're talking about caves, they're talking about tombs, they're talking about aqueducts and pools that were known to them at the time - probably with aliases of names applied to these places so that only those people who are part of the inner circle would know where to go, how many steps to go away and where to find the temple treasure that was buried in that spot." Pfann said.
The scroll's language is a mystery in itself.
Some passages use a style of Hebrew that's 800 years older than the scroll itself. Adding to the puzzle is a series of random Greek letters.
Pfann said, "It kind of freezes in time the language to around 70 AD to what the Hebrew language looked like among the common people of that time.
The Fate of the Lost Treasure
Pfann says anyone looking for it today is about 2,000 years too late.
"In my mind, most if not all of these were actually found by the Romans under the point of the sword … And we do know that Titus used the booty to build the Colosseum in Rome. It says so on the Colosseum. You can actually see the impression of the letters, 'this was built with the booty,'" Pfann said.
"If there's any treasure left, there would have been small parts that might not have been found that still lie out there ready for people to find today. We don't know," he said.
The scroll's last line hints at an even greater treasure, "In a dry well at Kohlit… a copy of this document with its explanation…and an inventory of each and every thing."
"What's interesting is that there were actually two treasure maps that were made," Pfann said.
"Line 64 of the copper scroll is the most fascinating of all - hard to decode but quite compelling," said author Joel Rosenberg.
The Discovery of all Discoveries
Rosenberg hit the New York Times bestseller list with his novel on the Copper Scroll.
He believes the second scroll is still out there and it could be the key to the greatest archaeological prize in history.
"What if finding the treasures of the Copper Scroll did in fact lead to the Ark of the Covenant being found?" he asked.
Rosenberg may be on to something.
Ancient Jewish writings say the ark and other first temple treasures were hidden by priests before the invasion of the Babylonians.
Their locations were inscribed on a tablet of copper.
Rosenberg said, "The Key Scroll has never been found, nobody has any idea where it is."
"What would be most dramatic is if in fact the treasures that are described by the Copper Scroll -and perhaps revealed more fully in the Key Scroll - are in fact from the second temple. Finding them would in fact be the most dramatic archeological discovery of all time."
Researchers: Asteroid Destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,343674,00.html
A clay tablet that has baffled scientists for 150 years has been identified as a witness's account of the asteroid suspected of being behind the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.
Researchers who cracked the cuneiform symbols on the Planisphere tablet believe that it recorded an asteroid thought to have been more than half a mile across.
The tablet, found by Henry Layard in the remains of the library in the royal place at Nineveh in the mid-19th century, is thought to be a 700 B.C. copy of notes made by a Sumerian astronomer watching the night sky.
He referred to the asteroid as a "white stone bowl approaching" and recorded it as it "vigorously swept along."
Using computers to recreate the night sky thousands of years ago, scientists have pinpointed his sighting to shortly before dawn on June 29 in the year 3123 B.C.
About half the symbols on the tablet have survived and half of those refer to the asteroid. The other symbols record the positions of clouds and constellations. In the past 150 years scientists have made five unsuccessful attempts to translate the tablet.
Mark Hempsell, one of the researchers from Bristol University who cracked the tablet's code, said: "It's a wonderful piece of observation, an absolutely perfect piece of science."
He said the size and route of the asteroid meant that it was likely to have crashed into the Austrian Alps at Köfels. As it traveled close to the ground it would have left a trail of destruction from supersonic shock waves and then slammed into the Earth with a cataclysmic impact.
Debris consisting of up to two-thirds of the asteroid would have been hurled back along its route and a flash reaching temperatures of 400 Centigrade (752 Fahrenheit) would have been created, killing anyone in its path.
About one million sq kilometers (386,000 sq miles) would have been devastated and the impact would have been equivalent to more than 1,000 tons of TNT exploding.
Dr Hempsall said that at least 20 ancient myths record devastation of the type and on the scale of the asteroid's impact, including the Old Testament tale of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah and the ancient Greek myth of how Phaeton, son of Helios, fell into the River Eridanus after losing control of his father's sun chariot.
The findings of Dr. Hempsall and Alan Bond, of Reaction Engines Ltd., are published in a book, "A Sumerian Observation of the Köfels Impact Event."
The researchers say that the asteroid's impact would explain why at Köfels there is evidence of an ancient landslide 3 miles wide and a quarter of a mile thick.
Tale of devastation
"Then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of Heaven; and he overthrew those cities and all the valley, and all the inhabitants of the cities ... [Abraham] looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah and toward all the land of the valley, and beheld, and lo, the smoke of the land went up like the smoke of a furnace."
Source: Genesis 19:24-28
Rick Warren launches 'Purpose Driven' plan in Uganda
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/rick.warren.launches.purpose.driven.plan.in.uganda/17610.htm
Megachurch pastor Rick Warren launched a national Purpose Driven Living programme in Uganda over the weekend aimed at helping the country’s leaders live purposeful lives that will build up their nation.
Churches, business and government leaders gathered Friday and Saturday to listen to the best-selling author of The Purpose Driven Life explain how to live a life of purpose and make a difference in the world.
"Our hope and prayer is that lives will be transformed and churches will be strengthened," Warren said in Uganda, according to the programme’s publicity team.
"My message to individuals is to build your life on purpose, instead of prestige, possessions or pleasure. My challenge to churches is to cooperate, not compete,” he added, “and my challenge to business and government leaders is to use their influence for the glory of God and partner with local churches in solving community problems."
The Archbishop of the Anglican Church of Uganda, the Most Rev Henry Luke Orombi, recalled initially wanting to invite Warren to Uganda after seeing the Purpose Driven Living programme implemented in Rwanda.
Uganda is the second east African country to invite Warren to bring the Purpose Driven Life and Church leadership training programme to the country on a national scale. The first east African country to adopt the programme nationwide was Rwanda in 2005.
“I asked, why not Uganda as well?" recalled Orombi, who spearheaded the effort to bring different denominations together with business and government leaders to invite Warren.
"Uganda should be a purpose-driven nation as well,” the Anglican archbishop said. “But it takes people of purpose to build purpose driven-churches, purpose-driven communities, and a purpose-driven country. Someday, we will have a purpose-driven continent!"
According to Dr Hamlet K Mbabazi, the former Member of Parliament who headed the organising committee, Warren – through his best-selling book – “has challenged us to go deeper into the Bible so we can grow stronger and reach out wider, knowing that God has called us to make a difference for Him."
"God has brought Pastor Warren, who has been a blessing to the world, to Uganda for such a time as this," he added.
During a meeting with Ugandan church leaders, the American megachurch pastor said that he believes the future of Christianity is not in Europe or North America, but in Africa, Asia and Latin America.
Warren also met with First Lady Janet Museveni to discuss the PEACE Plan – a global plan to fight the world’s biggest problems – and spoke to students at Uganda Christian University.
One non-Christian business leader told the event organiser, "For the first time, the Gospel made sense to me.”
Uganda is the first of three African countries Warren was scheduled to visit during his 12-day trip.
On Sunday, the Purpose Driven pastor headed to Rwanda to join President Paul Kagame in leading a national rally in Amahoro (Peace) Stadium in the nation’s capital to launch a nationwide 40 Days of Purpose campaign.
Warren serves on the President's Advisory Council of Rwanda which will be meeting later this week.
While in Rwanda, Warren and his wife Kay will also participate in a White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives conference in Kigali and inspect their Western Rwanda Healthcare Initiative – a PEACE plan project that is training churches to provide health care in partnerships with hospitals and the Ministry of Health.
Warren will later visit Nairobi to meet with church leaders in response to recent violence following the Kenya elections.
Two Nuns Attacked in Alibaug, India
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion07024.shtml
Sister Mercy Tuscano and Sister Philomena D'Mello were attacked by approximately 50 Hindu assailants on March 23 in the town of Alibaug, Maharashtra for allegedly converting tribal groups to Christianity.
The nuns were injured in the attack by the mob, which included women, who are followers of a spiritual leader in the area. Both nuns were treated in hospital and have since been released. They are members of a non-governmental organization that extends humanitarian services such as AIDS awareness to tribal groups in the region.
Pray for the recovery of the two nuns from their injuries. Ask the Lord to strengthen Indian Christians to continue serving the Lord despite pressure for their faith (1 Peter 5:10).
For more information on the suffering of Christians in India, go to www.persecution.net/country/india.htm. A video report on this incident is available at www.persecution.net/news/india273.html.
Bush, Putin May Agree on Missile Deal
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/348896.aspx
KIEV, Ukraine - The White House raised hopes Monday of achieving a breakthrough agreement to resolve bitter differences with Moscow over missile defenses in Europe when President Bush meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin this weekend.
Bush's national security adviser, Stephen Hadley, said no deal was in hand yet but the two leaders could nail it down when they meet Sunday in the Black Sea resort of Sochi. "We may. We're hopeful," he said. It will be the last meeting between the two men before Putin steps away from the Russian presidency.
Hadley briefed reporters on Air Force One as Bush flew to Ukraine to begin a weeklong trip in Eastern Europe, anchored by a NATO summit in Bucharest, Romania. Arriving in Kiev late at night, Bush was presented with a traditional greeting of bread and salt. His wife, Laura, was given a bouquet of flowers.
The Western military alliance has been strained by the refusal of Germany and other allies to send more combat troops to Afghanistan, prompting accusations from Washington that they are shirking their duty. France announced last week it would send more forces, probably a battalion of elite paratroopers. That has reduced some of the pressure and allowed Bush and other leaders to step back from a NATO clash. Britain and Poland also are expected to do more.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates, in Denmark ahead of the NATO summit, set measured expectations.
"I would be surprised if we saw commitments in Bucharest at a level that would fully meet all the requirements" for combat troops and military and police trainers, Gates said. "But we'll just keep working at it."
The United States wants not only more troops, but also fewer restrictions from some governments on how their troops can be used.
"We've all been saying that we all need to do more," Hadley said. "We've also been saying this is going to be a long effort and we're going to have to be committed to a long-term effort in Afghanistan. I think that's true. We need to step it up. I think you'll find that countries are stepping up. That's a good next step. But there are going to be more steps down the road."
The U.S. proposal for a missile defense shield in Eastern Europe has been a major source of friction between Washington and Moscow.
For months, Putin has ratcheted up his anti-American rhetoric, demanding that the United States abandon the plan, which would be based in Poland and the Czech Republic, two former Soviet satellites. Putin has complained it would upset the balance of power and was aimed at weakening Russia, charges the United States has repeatedly denied.
In recent days, there have been signs of progress toward resolving the dispute. Bush sent Gates and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to Moscow with concessions to ease Russia's concerns. Bush also sent a personal letter to Putin. A Russian delegation spent several days in Washington last week working on the problem.
The United States has offered to let Russia monitor the system and share in the information that is collected. Bush also has offered not to activate the system until there is a verifiable threat from Iran or some other adversary.
"I think we're moving in a direction where ... Russia and the United States could have missile defense as an area of strategic cooperation," Hadley said.
Bush, in an interview last week, insisted the missile shield was not aimed at Russia. "After all, it doesn't take many missiles to overwhelm the kind of system we're talking about," Bush said. "And Russia has got plenty of missiles if they want to overwhelm." Bush said the shield was intended to protect from missiles launched from the Middle East, where the United States regards Iran as a primary threat.
Before traveling to Romania, Bush stopped in Ukraine to praise its democratic reforms and encourage its drive to join NATO. Ukraine wants to be put on the path toward eventual membership and hopes NATO will provide a membership action plan that outlines what it needs to do to join. Georgia also wants a membership action plan, which is a precursor to the granting of full membership.
Russia is adamantly opposed to either Romania or Georgia getting on the NATO track. With nine former Soviet bloc countries already in NATO, Russia fiercely opposes the eastward expansion of an alliance it denounces as a Cold War relic.
Germany and France have spoken out against putting Ukraine on the list just yet, fearing upsetting already strained ties with Russia, a major supplier of energy to Europe.
NATO is expected to formally invite Croatia and Albania to join the alliance. Macedonia also is on the list but could be blocked by Greece. Greece has insisted it will veto Macedonia if it does not change its name. Greece feels the name, which is the same as a neighboring province of northern Greece, implies a territorial claim.
Departing Putin Seeks to Stop NATO Gains
http://www.newsmax.com/international/russia_vs_nato/2008/03/31/84378.html
MOSCOW -- This week's NATO summit in Romania will be Vladimir Putin's last appearance at a top-level international forum before he steps down as Russian president, still pushing to halt NATO's expansion into the stomping grounds of the former Soviet Union.
The Kremlin realizes it doesn't have the power to force the West to reverse its recognition of Kosovo's independence or persuade Washington to drop its plan to deploy missile defenses in Poland and the Czech Republic.
But Putin has had notable success in blocking NATO membership for its former Soviet neighbors _ Ukraine and Georgia.
"Georgia's accession into NATO will be seen here as an attempt to trigger a war in the Caucasus, and NATO membership for Ukraine will be interpreted as an effort to foment a conflict with Russia," said Sergei Markov, a Russian parliament member with close links to the Kremlin.
Amid a litany of such threats from Moscow, some NATO members are reluctant to inflame tensions at the three-day summit that begins Wednesday in Bucharest.
On Monday, NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said admitting the two countries to NATO was "not a matter of whether, but when." However, he said the launch of the membership process might be delayed at this week's gathering.
NATO decisions are made by consensus, and there is no hiding the divisions over whether to put Ukraine and Georgia formally on the road to membership. While Washington and new NATO members in central and eastern Europe strongly support it, Germany and some European partners are opposed.
Last week diplomats at NATO headquarters, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the summit would likely produce a statement of support for the Ukrainian and Georgian bids and an offer of increased cooperation, but no more than that.
"Many alliance members would prefer to avoid a move which would badly damage relations with Russia," said Fyodor Lukyanov, editor of the magazine Russia in Global Affairs.
The fact that Putin is attending the summit of former Cold War enemies is a powerful image of a world transformed. He is not going to sit in on the discussions, but to join the alliance leaders for brief talks about Russia-NATO relations on the last day, assuming it is clear by then that the Ukrainian and Georgian membership bids have been shelved.
Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the Kremlin has watched in frustration as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization has spread to Russia's borders by taking in three former Soviet republics and six former satellite countries.
For both historical and strategic reasons, membership for Ukraine and Georgia provoke the strongest resistance.
Putin has responded to Western policies by resuming strategic bomber patrols, sending a naval squadron into the Mediterranean in the most ambitious deployment since the Cold War, and warning that Russia might point its nuclear missiles at Ukraine if it joins NATO and hosts a missile defense system.
Ukraine is deeply divided, with its western regions backing NATO membership and the Russian-speaking east and south fiercely opposing it.
"We aren't going to just sit down and watch our people being dragged into NATO like slaves," said Markov, the Russian legislator.
Georgia's bid, meanwhile, is undermined by unresolved conflicts in two breakaway provinces, Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Moscow has developed close ties with both, and Russia's Kremlin-controlled parliament has called for "speeding up" sovereignty for the secessionists if Georgia's NATO bid goes forward.
"If Georgia joins NATO, Abkhazia and South Ossetia will come to Russia's doorstep, pleading to save them from NATO," said Alexander Konovalov, head of the Moscow-based Institute for Strategic Assessment. "Russia will be forced to recognize their independence, even though it doesn't want to do so."
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov left Russia's tactical position unclear Monday. "We cannot ignore the opinion of the parliament" on the separatist regions, he said, but "President Putin has stated numerous times that he stands for the territorial integrity of Georgia."
The Kremlin's defiance is encouraged by eight years of Russia's oil-driven economic boom that filled government coffers with petrodollars.
Putin says newly elected President Dmitry Medvedev, whom he will serve as prime minister, will be no less firm about defending Russia's national interests. Medvedev spoke strongly against NATO's expansion to Russia's borders in a recent interview.
Viktor Kremenyuk, deputy head of the USA and Canada Institute, a Moscow-based think tank, said that if NATO keeps its hands off Georgia and Ukraine, Putin will likely be more cooperative in his last five weeks as president and offer to boost cooperation with the alliance.
There are also hopes for easing the dispute over missile defense.
U.S. officials have proposed allowing Moscow to closely monitor the prospective missile defense sites in Poland and the Czech Republic, and after the summit Bush will visit Putin at his Black Sea residence in Sochi in hopes of resolving the dispute.
But Lukyanov doubts Russia will give ground until the Bush administration is gone.
Defense Department Analyst Pleads Guilty to Passing on Data to Chinese-Connected Business
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,343969,00.html
ALEXANDRIA, Va. — A Defense Department analyst pleaded guilty Monday to delivering classified information about U.S. and Taiwanese military communications systems to a Louisiana businessman working with the Chinese government.
Gregg Bergersen, 51, of Alexandria, a weapons analyst at the Defense Security Cooperation Agency who held top secret security clearances, was arrested last month. Prosecutors alleged he divulged military secrets to a New Orleans furniture salesman, Tai Kuo, who turned over the information to communist China.
In a plea hearing Monday, Bergersen pleaded guilty to a single count of conspiring to communicate national defense information to a person not entitled to receive it. He faces up to 10 years in prison when sentenced on June 20.
According to a statement of facts, Bergersen received thousands of dollars in cash from Kuo since March 2007, including $3,000 in cash for playing poker during an April 2007 gambling trip to Las Vegas. The document also states that Bergersen thought that Kuo was closely affiliated with the Taiwan Ministry of Defense. He was unaware though that Kuo also maintained contact with a foreign official from Beijing, to whom Kuo was relaying the information.
An FBI affidavit filed last month spelled out detailed evidence against Kuo, including taped conversations in which Bergersen acknowledged to Kuo that he could go to jail for his actions.
The affidavit says that Kuo provided gambling money and show tickets on trips to Las Vegas and in at least one instance caught on videotape, gave Bergersen a half-inch thick stack of folded cash, with a $100 bill on the outside.
Kuo and a third defendant, Chinese national Yu Xin Kang, 33, face more serious charges that carry a possible life sentence. Both are in jail awaiting trial.
Kuo, 58, is a naturalized U.S. citizen and a native of Taiwan. He is the son-in-law of Xue Yue, a Chinese nationalist general who was a close associate of Chiang Kai-shek.
Prosecutors allege that Kang, 33, served as the go-between for Kuo and the People's Republic of China.
Some of the weapons information passed between Bergersen and Kuo related to Taiwan's new Po Sheng air defense system. Taiwanese military officials have said the disclosures caused some damage but did not compromise key technology.
The Chinese government has called the accusations of espionage in the Po Sheng affair groundless and accused the U.S. of "Cold War thinking."
N. Korea Criticizes S. Korean President
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/348997.aspx
SEOUL, South Korea - North Korea's media criticized South Korea's new president for the first time since his inauguration in a blistering rebuke, warning Tuesday that Seoul's pro-U.S. policies could lead to "irrevocable catastrophic consequences."
The lengthy article in the North's main Rodong Sinmun daily came amid a series of provocations by the communist nation that have stoked tensions on the divided peninsula.
Last week, North Korea test-fired missiles and ejected South Korean officials from a shared industrial zone. Over the weekend, a North Korean military commentator threatened to turn the South into "ashes" in a pre-emptive strike, responding to comments by a South Korean military commander that Seoul could target suspected North Korean nuclear sites if there were signs of a pending attack from Pyongyang.
The North's moves were aimed at swaying new conservative South Korean President Lee Myung-bak from taking a tougher stand on his communist neighbor.
On Tuesday, the North called Lee a "conservative political charlatan" in the newspaper commentary carried by the official Korean Central News Agency. It said the South should not meddle in ongoing international nuclear talks that include the U.S. by demanding disarmament as a precondition for North-South cooperation.
Lee "is making a mess of the process to denuclearize the peninsula," the newspaper said.
The two Koreas have made unprecedented strides toward reconciliation under a past decade of liberal presidents, holding the first summit between the North and South in 2000 and reconnecting transportation links across their heavily armed frontier. That has happened despite the two Koreas remaining technically at war, after the three-year Korean War ended in a 1953 cease-fire that has never been replaced with a peace treaty.
Lee has said he will demand more in exchange for South Korean aid to the impoverished North and his government is not shying from criticizing Pyongyang's alleged human rights abuses.
The North Korean newspaper said "Lee's seizure of power created a thorn bush in the way of the inter-Korean relations," and warned he "should not misjudge the patience and silence so far kept by" the North.
"The Lee regime will be held fully accountable for the irrevocable catastrophic consequences to be entailed by the freezing of the inter-Korean relations and the disturbance of peace and stability on the Korean peninsula due to its sycophancy towards the U.S. and its moves for confrontation with the North," the commentary said, without giving specifics.
The South Korean president's office will determine how to react after analyzing the North Korean commentary, spokesman Lee Dong-kwan told reporters, according to his office.
Face of Christianity will soon be black, says scholar
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/face.of.christianity.will.soon.be.black.says.scholar/17583.htm
Christianity has long been stereotyped as a Western, white man’s religion, but a prominent theologian believes that image will soon drastically change.
“The new face of Christianity will be the black woman,” said Dr Kwok Pui Lan to an audience at Lexington Theological Seminary in Kentucky, according to the Lexington Herald-Leader. Kwok, a professor at the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is a pioneer in Asian feminist theology as well as postcolonial theology.
Kwok explained that as of last year, Europe still had the largest number of Christians in the world – 532 million. It is followed by Latin America with 525 million and then Africa at 417 million.
But by 2025, Africa is projected to shoot up to 634.6 million Christians, followed closely by Latin America at 634.1 million, while Europe will fall to 531 million Christians.
The United States had 223 million Christians mid-2007 and is predicted to grow slightly to 252 million by 2025.
"The challenge is to re-imagine Christianity in the 21st century," said Kwok, who is the William F Cole professor of Christian Theology and Spirituality at the Episcopal Divinity School.
In 1900, over 80 per cent of all Christians were from Europe and North America, but by 2005 the number was under 45 per cent, observed Dr Todd Johnson, director of the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, in his 2006 report entitled USA evangelicals/Evangelicals in a Global Context.
Johnson had noted that the number correlated with new data that revealed a southern shift in Christianity away from the UK and US.
Offering an explanation for Christianity’s boom in Africa, the Rev Dr Samuel Kobia – the first African General Secretary of the World Council of Churches – said late last year that Christianity is not seen as a “part-time” occupation in Africa in comparison to the US, but rather “permeates the whole life”.
“Christianity in Africa, sub-Saharan Africa especially, is seen not only as a religion, but this is the opportunity of people to contribute to national building, to peace and reconciliation, to development,” said Kobia at Washington National Cathedral in December. “Therefore the church becomes the center of activity.”
Besides discussing Christianity’s southern shift, Episcopal Divinity’s Kwok also explored the post-colonial world after World War II, when many colonies became independent.
In her lecture entitled “Globalization and the Challenge to Christianity”, Kwok contended that globalisation provides opportunities to advance religion, and religion can offer societies a common value system such as human rights. But globalisation also presents obstacles to religion, including a counter movement that resorts to violence to retain their beliefs and identities.
Kwok was the guest speaker at The William Daniel Cobb II Lectures at Lexington Theological Seminary. The special lecture began in 1990 in memory of the seminary’s 12th president, inviting a distinguished speaker on theology to the seminary each year.
Media's 'Go-To' Man on Religion in Public Schools, Charles Haynes, Unqualified, Has Conflict of Interest
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion07023.shtml
LINWOOD, New Jersey -- Freedom Forum First Amendment Center Senior Scholar, Charles Haynes, the news media's "go-to" man on religion in education, is not qualified to speak on legal Constitutional issues and Haynes should recuse himself when discussing teaching Bible in public schools because of a conflict of interest due to his longstanding association with the Bible Literacy Project, which is marketing a textbook to public schools that has raised great concern with many Christians.
Haynes, who is often called by the news media to give expert opinion on the Constitutional issues of teaching religion in public schools, lacks the formal training of a lawyer and does not hold a law degree, yet he has interpreted for the media how the legal framework of the separation of church and state applies to the public schools. Haynes' background as a former employee of Americans United For Separation of Church and State and his close association with the American Civil Liberties Union and the Communitarian Network undoubtedly have shaped his viewpoint on religion in the public square.
Haynes' true colors show in his written works. In "When the Government Prays No One Wins," Haynes infers that the National Day of Prayer should be illegal. Haynes wrote "The Relationship of Religion to Moral Education in the Public Schools," a manifesto of religion in public schools for the Communitarian Network, which Joseph Farah of WorldNetDaily describes as "a new form of Communism for people who believe in God." Haynes also writes educational documents for the Council On Islamic Education. In addition, Haynes authored "Public Schools and Sexual Orientation: A First Amendment Framework," which is endorsed by the radical Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network. Activist ACLU attorney, Oliver Thomas and Haynes coauthored "Finding Common Ground: A First Amendment Guide to Religion and Public Education," where Haynes gives his legal interpretations, which no doubt have been filtered through his coauthor.
Haynes has been endorsed by Hartley Films, a division of The Temple of Understanding, which tries to move New Age videos into the public schools. Titles currently offered by the Hartley Film Foundation include "Buddhism: the Path to Enlightenment," "Hinduism and the Song of God," "Requiem for a Faith (Tibetan Buddhism)," "Taoism and Trip to Awareness: A Jain Pilgrimage to India." Further, Haynes is a board member of the Pluralism Project, and serves alongside a Wicca Priestess.
But Haynes' conflict of interest lies in his support of the Bible Literacy Project's (BLP) efforts to teach the Bible to public high school students using a textbook "The Bible and Its Influence." Haynes uses his position at the Freedom Forum First Amendment Center (formerly the liberal Gannet Foundation) to appear unbiased to the news media while he endorses and promotes the BLP textbook as a legally acceptable means of teaching the Bible in public schools. Haynes and the BLP partnered in developing the guidelines to which the textbook was written (The Bible and Public Schools: A First Amendment Guide), and Haynes is a contributor to the textbook.
Haynes has called local school districts considering offering Bible classes and has implied a strong possibility that the texts will invite a legal challenge from the ACLU. Haynes then recommends in their place the BLP textbook. The textbook is supposed to be about the Bible, but some have suggested that it follows Haynes' ideology by casting doubt on faith principles of the Bible, placing Islam in a favorable light, suggesting that the Bible was used to justify communism, and by promoting the United Nations Education, Science and Cultural Organization, which uses literacy as a tool to sponsor homosexuality, abortion, and religious pluralism.
Judge Roy Moore and Foundation for Moral Law Argue to Federal Appeals Court that Texas Jury's Use of Bible did not Taint Deliberations in Death Penalty Case, 'Oliver v. Quarterman'
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion07021.shtml
Former Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore and attorneys with the Foundation for Moral Law argued in an amicus curiae brief filed today in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit that a Texas jury's consultation of Bible passages during death-penalty sentencing deliberations did not taint the jury in violation of the 6th Amendment. The Foundation argued in the case, Oliver v. Quarterman, that a jury's use of the Bible is a natural occurrence since a jury has historically reflected the diversity of the community from which it is drawn, including members who consider the Bible an integral part of their faith and morality. (Read the legal brief here.)
Judge Roy Moore, a former Alabama circuit court judge before he was Chief Justice, said about this important case:
"For centuries, the name of God and the sacredness of the Bible in the courts have traditionally served as powerful reminders of the standard of truth and justice to which judge, jury, and defendant alike are accountable. To suggest that the Bible and religious references should now be banned from jury deliberations is not only a subversion of the purpose of a citizen jury, but it reflects yet another attempt to sequester God and His law from our courtrooms and justice system."
In the Oliver case, convicted murderer Khristian Oliver argues that his death penalty sentence should be overturned because several jury members brought Bibles and consulted a scripture verse or two in the deliberation room. Oliver argues that the mere reference to Bible passages tainted the proceedings and rendered the jury "impartial," in violation of the 6th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
The Foundation, however, explains in its brief that juries are an essential and historic check by the people on government power and, as such, comprise a cross-section of the community. To banish the Bible, religious references, and the people that hold biblical values dear from the jury room would deprive our juries of that considerable portion of the citizenry that look to the Bible for comfort, wisdom, and moral judgment. A "Bible-free" jury would not reflect the communities of this country and would, in effect, establish a reverse religious test to qualify for jury service.
The Foundation asks the 5th Circuit court to reject Oliver's desperate claims as constitutionally, historically, and logically baseless.
The Foundation for Moral Law is a non-profit, religious-liberties organization located in Montgomery, Alabama, dedicated to restoring the knowledge of God in law and government through litigation and education relating to moral issues and religious liberty.
New President Seeks to Establish Model for a Biblical Univ.
http://news.christiansunite.com/Religion_News/religion07020.shtml
LANGHORNE, Penn. -- On February 7, 2008, Todd J. Williams, Ph.D., was formally installed as Philadelphia Biblical University's (PBU) fifth president.
One of the hallmarks of Williams' presidency will be his vision to define and establish PBU as a model for a "Biblical University" where curriculum and philosophy not only distinguish the institution from Christian liberal arts, or Bible colleges, but where the PBU experience is marked by Christian scholarship, and service informed by a biblical worldview.
Also, he will continue to develop the academic endeavors of PBU-founded in 1913 and a recognized leader in Christian higher education-as well as elevate the profile of the University within the region through an integrated institutional marketing plan and campaign that is already underway.
Prior to his appointment by PBU's Board of Trustees on October 11, 2007, he had served as the University's Sr. Vice President and Provost since 2005. Dr. Williams' predecessor Dr. W. Sherrill Babb, who was PBU's president for 28 years, was appointed Chancellor.
Williams, a cum laude graduate of PBU, is the first alumnus to serve as president of the University. He began his academic career at PBU in 1994 when he joined the faculty in the School of Arts and Sciences. He rose through the ranks as Associate Dean of Undergraduate Education and then became Vice President and Academic Dean before leaving in 2001 to become headmaster and CEO at Trinity Christian School in Fairfax, VA, a suburb of Washington, D.C.
He returned to PBU in July 2005 as Sr. Vice President and Provost where he developed and implemented numerous initiatives and plans to enhance and strengthen PBU's academic programs including a Center for University Studies and appointment of a faculty scholar; and a curriculum revision that broadened course offerings across a spectrum of disciplines. Students and faculty alike responded enthusiastically to his leadership and his challenge to apply Christian perspectives and biblical worldview in the marketplace of ideas.
President Williams holds a B.S. in Bible degree from PBU and his M.Ed and Ph.D. degrees from Temple University in Philadelphia. He speaks in churches, schools, colleges, businesses, and professional organizations on issues of Christianity, culture, education and leadership. He was visiting lecturer for spiritual formation at the Witherspoon Fellowship in Washington, D.C. and serves on the Board of Governors of the John Jay Institute for Faith, Society and Law in Colorado Springs, CO.
Tensions rise as world faces short rationshttp://www.christiantoday.com/article/tensions.rise.as.world.faces.short.rations/17602.htm
Food prices are soaring, a wealthier Asia is demanding better food and farmers can't keep up. In short, the world faces a food crisis and in some places it's already boiling over.
Around the globe, people are protesting and governments are responding with often counterproductive controls on prices and exports - a new politics of scarcity in which ensuring food supplies is becoming a major challenge for the 21st century.
Plundered by severe weather in producing countries and by a boom in demand from fast-developing nations, the world's wheat stocks are at 30-year lows. Grain prices have been on the rise for five years, ending decades of cheap food.
Drought, a declining U.S. dollar, a shift of investment money into commodities and use of farm land to grow fuel have all contributed to food woes. But population growth and the growing wealth of China and other emerging countries are likely to be more enduring factors.
World population is set to hit 9 billion by 2050, and most of the extra 2.5 billion people will live in the developing world. It is in these countries that the population is demanding dairy and meat, which require more land to produce.
"This is an additional setback for the world economy, at a time when we are already going through major turbulence. But the biggest drama is the impact of higher food prices on the poor," Angel Gurria, head of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, or OECD, told Reuters.
In Gurria's native Mexico, tens of thousands took to the streets last year over the cost of tortillas, a national staple whose price rocketed in tandem with the price of corn (maize).
Global food prices, based on United Nations records, rose 35 percent in the year to the end of January, markedly accelerating an upturn that began, gently at first, in 2002. Since then, prices have risen 65 percent.
In 2007 alone, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization's world food index, dairy prices rose nearly 80 percent and grain 42 percent.
"The recent rise in global food commodity prices is more than just a short-term blip," British think tank Chatham House said in January. "Society will have to decide the value to be placed on food and how ... market forces can be reconciled with domestic policy objectives."
Many countries are already facing these choices.
After long opposition, Mexico's government is considering lifting a ban on genetically modified crops, to allow its farmers to compete with the United States, where high-yield, genetically modified corn is the norm.
The European Union and parts of Africa have similar bans that could also be reconsidered.
A number of governments, including Egypt, Argentina, Kazakhstan, and China, have imposed restrictions to limit grain exports and keep more of their food at home.
This knee-jerk response to food emergencies can result in farmers producing less food and threatens to undermine years of effort to open up international trade.
"If one country after the other adopts a 'starve-your-neighbour' policy, then eventually you trade smaller shares of total world production of agricultural products, and that in turn makes the prices more volatile," said Joachim von Braun, director general of the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington.
In Argentina, a government tax on grain led to a strike by farmers that disrupted grain exports.
Vietnam and India, both major rice exporters, announced further curbs on overseas sales on Friday, sending rice higher on U.S. futures markets. Other food commodities retreated from record highs in recent days but analysts attributed that less to fundamentals and more to profit-taking by investors.
DISCONTENT
In the next decade, the price of corn could rise 27 percent, oilseeds such as soybeans by 23 percent and rice 9 percent, according to tentative forecasts in February by the OECD and the U.N.
Waves of discontent are already starting to be felt. Violent protests hit Cameroon and Burkina Faso in February. Protesters rallied in Indonesia recently and media reported deaths by starvation. In the Philippines, fast-food chains were urged to cut rice portions to counter a surge in prices.
Last year, the central bank of Australia -- where minds were focused by a two-year drought -- asked whether the surge in commodity prices could be one of the few really big ones in world history, like those of the mid-1930s or the 1970s.
Real commodity prices remained flat or even fell during the rapid industrialization of the United States and Germany in the early 20th century. But the industrialization of China, with 1.3 billion people, is on a totally different scale, it noted.
"China's population is proportionately much larger than the countries that industrialized in earlier periods and is almost double that of the current G7 nations combined," the Australian central bank said.
The emergence of China's middle class is adding hugely to demand for not just basic commodities like corn, soybeans and wheat, but also for meat, milk and other high-protein foods.
The Chinese, whose rise began in earnest in 2001, ate just 20 kilograms (44 pounds) of meat per capita in 1985. They now eat 50 kilograms (110 pounds) a year.
Each pound of beef takes about seven pounds of grain to produce, which means land that could be used to grow food for humans is being diverted to growing animal feed.
BIOFUEL TROUBLE
As the West seeks to tackle the risk of global warming, a drive towards greener fuels is compounding the world's food problems.
It is estimated that one in four bushels of corn from this year's U.S. corn crop will be diverted to make fuel ethanol.
"Turning food into fuel for cars is a major mistake on many fronts." said Janet Larsen, director of research at the Earth Policy Institute, an environmental group based in Washington.
"One, we're already seeing higher food prices in the American supermarket. Two, perhaps more serious from a global perspective, we're seeing higher food prices in developing countries where it's escalated as far as people rioting in the streets."
Similarly, palm oil is at record prices because of demand to use it for biofuel, causing pain for low income families in Indonesia and Malaysia, where it is a staple.
But despite the rising criticism of biofuels, the U.S. corn-fed ethanol industry enjoys wide political support because it boosts farmers, who suffered years of low prices, and that support is likely to continue.
John Bruton, the European Union's Ambassador to the United States, predicts that the world faces 10 to 15 years of steep rises in food costs. And it is the poor in Africa and, increasingly, South East Asia, who will be most vulnerable.
The director of the U.N. World Food Program, Josette Sheeran, is on a global tour in search of donations to fill a $500 million funding gap caused by the rising prices. America's largest aid program, Food for Peace, has seen its commodity prices jump 40 percent and may have to curtail donations.
But aid and many policy options available to governments for helping the hungry distort markets and cause pain elsewhere in their economies, according to proponents of free markets.
"I was involved in a government that introduced food subsidies in Ireland and we had the devil's own job to get rid of them," said Bruton, who was Prime Minister of Ireland from 1994 to 1997.
Others trust that better fertilizers and higher-yielding crops - some of them genetically modified - will keep production in line with demand.
Bruce Babcock, an economist at Iowa State University, said the rising markets are a signal to farmers that they need to raise production.
"It's actually the greatest time in the world to be a farmer around the world," Babcock said. "We are going to see fairly substantial increases in production because farmers have never had such a large incentive to increase production."
But others note that expensive seeds and fertilizers are out of reach of farmers in poor countries.
Around the beginning of the 19th Century, British political economist Thomas Malthus said population had the potential to grow much faster than food supply, a prediction that efficient farming consistently proved wrong. Now, at the beginning of the 21st century, some are revisiting his predictions.
No comments:
Post a Comment