McCain's pastor a sharp contrast to Obama's
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080322/pl_nm/usa_politics_mccain_pastor_dc;_ylt=ApL.3TSWtRyo31Nyh.UUMEas0NUE
John McCain's Phoenix pastor, Dan Yeary, is a folksy patriotic Southern Baptist who opposes abortion and believes homosexuality to be a biblical sin, but says Christians have an obligation to love such sinners.
That puts Yeary, who heads the church attended for the past 15 years by the Republican presidential candidate firmly in the U.S. Southern Baptist mainstream, and in line with the Republican Party.
He offers a sharp contrast to Democratic contender Barack Obama's former preacher Jeremiah Wright, who has stirred controversy with his fiery comments on race and America.
Obama had been seen by some analysts as having an edge over McCain on issues of faith because of his adult conversion experience and his ease in talking about his faith. But his own preacher has proven a political liability.
In a country where religion and politics often mix, 25 percent of American adults count themselves as evangelical Christians, giving them huge influence as the country heads to the November 4 presidential election to succeed President George W. Bush.
McCain draws some support from this group but many conservative Christians are uneasy with him because of his support for stem-cell research and his past criticism of leaders in the movement.
Yeary, pastor for the 7,000-member North Phoenix Baptist Church, professes little interest in politics and prefers to focus on preaching and spiritual guidance. But McCain's affiliation with Yeary will do him no harm in wooing support from the key Republican base of evangelical Christians.
"John and I are friends, he has called on me to minister to the family in times of challenge and difficulty," he told Reuters in a telephone interview.
McCain, a former prisoner-of-war in Vietnam, was raised in the Episcopal Church but has been attending Yeary's church for about 15 years. Yeary declined to comment on McCain's reluctance to finally undergo a baptism ceremony, a key ritual of the faith.
"John and I are having continual dialogue about his spiritual pursuits," Yeary said.
In an interview last year with InsideCatholic.com, an on-line Catholic forum devoted to issues of faith, McCain said he liked Yeary's "message of reconciliation and redemption which I'm a great believer in."
"And so I began attending North Phoenix Baptist church and I'm grateful for the spiritual advice and counsel that I continue to get from Pastor Dan Yeary."
McCain, like his pastor, is staunchly opposed to abortion rights but Yeary said the pair had never discussed the issue.
"Have we talked about abortion? No," Yeary said. "I believe that abortion is wrong and I believe that it is a very, very poor choice ... I believe it should be outlawed."
The 69-year-old Yeary adheres to the Southern Baptist belief that gay marriage and homosexual relations go against Biblical scripture, hot-button issues for many in the United States.
"The Bible is pretty clear about it, in my opinion it specifically calls it a sin. I also am a sinner and you are a sinner. ... Did Jesus Christ love homosexuals? I'm sure he did," Yeary said.
PRESERVE FRIENDSHIP
Obama's preacher by contrast sparked howls of protest for his angry sermons over what he called racist America, charging that the September 11 attacks were retribution for U.S. foreign policy and claiming Washington was the source of the AIDS virus.
Wright was Obama's pastor in Chicago for two decades but the Illinois senator, locked in a tight battle with New York Sen. Hillary Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination, distanced himself from Wright in a widely hailed speech addressing race issues earlier this week.
Obama would be the first black U.S. president.
"In the United States, the sacred cow is the concept of the nation -- someone who is a religious minister can say almost anything they want and not get into trouble in the political realm unless they go after the nation," said David Domke, a professor of communication at the University of Washington.
Yeary was sympathetic as a fellow pastor and said while he did not agree with Wright's comments, all preachers eventually got caught in the trap of their own exuberance.
"All preachers have a tendency to overstate because our passion is so intense. But I thought Obama did a fine job in response. He preserved his friendship with his pastor while disagreeing with him," Yeary said.
"I'm sure John McCain would probably say the same thing about me if he were asked 'So, do you agree with everything your pastor says?"' he added with a laugh.
Obama: Grandma Is 'Typical White Person'
http://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/Obama_grandma_racism/2008/03/20/82022.html
On Thursday, Sen. Barack Obama described his grandmother's racial attitudes as those of a "typical white person."
During a morning interview with Philadephia's WIP and its host Angelo Cataldi, Obama was asked about his reference to his white grandmother in his recent speech on Reverend Wright.
Obama responded:
"The point I was making was not that my grandmother harbors any racial animosity. She doesn't. But she is a typical white person who, uh, if she sees somebody on the street that she doesn't know there's a reaction that's been been bred into our experiences that don't go away and that sometimes come out in the wrong way and that's just the nature of race in our society. We have to break through it."
Listen to Obama's Speaking About "Typical White" Grandmother - Click Here Now
During his speech on race Obama said his grandmother was "a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world," but he then qualified that description by noting she was also "a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe."
Some Republican critics have pounced on Obama for comparing Wright's incendiary rhetoric with his 86-year-old grandmother's prejudices.
"I also think it was, intellectually, fundamentally dishonest," former House Speaker Newt Gingrich told Fox News after the Obama speech. "To [compare] a 20-year relationship with a public figure to his grandmother is just wrong. It's emotionally powerful, but it's just wrong. I mean, the core question that Senator Obama has to answer is very simple. For 20 years, he was a member of a church where he now says his pastor, a public figure, was saying things ... forget that they were hateful, forget that they were divisive: They were wrong. They were fundamentally, factually wrong."
The New York Daily News election blog quoted Ben LaBolt, an Obama spokesman, offering a clarification: “Barack Obama said specifically that he didn’t believe his grandmother harbored any racial animosity but that her fears were understandable and typical of those often shared by her generation.”
The News wrote: "Ummm, that’s not what he said."
LaBolt continued: "But the campaign also said the senator did not mean to suggest all white people share his grandmother’s reaction to seeing a black person pass her by on the street."
“His intentions may have been misconstrued,” he said. The Obama campaign has also argued that many of Pastor Wright's comments have been "taken out of context."
40 days of mourning almost up - Hizbullah prepares spectacular attack to avenge assasination
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1205420731311&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
This Saturday will mark 40 days since Imad Mughniyeh's assassination on February 12 by a car bomb in Damascus. Hizbullah's TV and Web sites have derided Israel's worries ahead of a possible major terrorist attack which "keep Israeli political, military, and security officials up nights."
In light of their past behavior, Hizbullah and Iranian threats must be taken very seriously.
They have three main options: an attack on northern Israel from South Lebanon, a major terrorist attack inside Israel or a major act of terror against Israeli or Jewish targets abroad.
Hizbullah has rearmed itself with a huge amount of long-range missiles and still has a large clandestine infrastructure in southern Lebanon.
Yet the presence of the UNIFIL forces on the ground, the sharp criticism of the organization in the United Nations' latest report on Resolution 1701 and the unsolved Lebanese internal situation could endanger the group's long-range political goals and standing.
Moreover, Iran is probably not interested in a new conflagration at a time when its nuclear project has a good chance of surviving the latest international sanctions.
In case of an attack against Israeli or Jewish targets abroad, based on the example of the two attacks in Buenos Aires, it would be clear to everybody that this is a Hizbullah or Iran/Hizbullah operation and the political price could be very high.
The easiest way for retaliation would be a "mega-attack" inside Israel or the assassination of a high-level personality by a Palestinian proxy.
Not only would it be more difficult to accuse Hizbullah of such an attack, but this could have a very negative impact on the negotiating process with the Palestinian Authority and would possibly provoke a major IDF operation in Gaza if it appeared that the attack was prepared there.
The last attack against the Mercaz Harav Yeshiva could be an example, if it is not already the beginning of the retaliation.
Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah, speaking in Beirut at a ceremony in February to mark "Resistance Week," said that Hizbullah is today in "the stage of martyr Imad Mughniyeh's blood."
This phase "focuses on developing the resistance on the operational level and opening new horizons. The escalation of operations has transformed the resistance's strategy from a traditional guerrilla war into a new unprecedented fighting school; somewhere between guerrilla war and traditional armies' operations."
Will Hizbullah act with Iran to retaliate for Mughniyeh's assassination?
Heading a high-level Iranian delegation, Iran's Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki attended Mughniyeh's funeral in Beirut "to commemorate the great hero" and expressed condolences "on behalf of the Iranian government and people."
Mughniyeh is being projected as an Iranian hero. According to Abu Wafa, a former leader in the Revolutionary Guards, on his first trip to Iran in the early 1980s Mughniyeh proved his military capabilities and excelled in his training.
After three months of basic training, he traveled to the Iranian front and took part in several daring operations behind Iraqi lines.
Islamist bloggers in Iran have also praised Mughniyeh and published some very rare photos of him.
Blogger Mersad described him as "a super Mujaheed of the Islamic world…one of Ayatollah Khomeini's children."
Iranian leaders made harsh statements against Israel, stronger even than Hizbullah's. Iranian Ambassador to Syria Ahmad Moussavi warned that the death of Mughniyeh "will lead to an earthquake in the Zionist regime."
The head of the Revolutionary Guards, Muhammad Ali Jafari, predicted that Israel would be destroyed by Hizbullah in the "near future."
Although Iranian officials have refrained from openly accusing Arab states of being involved in Mughniyeh's assassination, they have publicly expressed belief that the region is on the brink of conflict.
Ali Akbar Mohtashamipur, a co-founder of Hizbullah and current secretary general of the International Committee for Supporting the Palestinian People, claimed Mughniyeh's assassination was a "prelude" to "very dangerous and major events in the next few months" and that the US, Israel, and Arab states seek "to direct Lebanese issues toward a civil war."
Syria is itching to respond. Sadr-al-Din al-Bayanuni, controller general of Syria's Muslim Brotherhood, noted that all the world's channels covered the incident in real time except Syrian television.
Former Syrian vice president Abd al-Halim Khaddam, relating to Syrian television's failure to report Mughniyeh's assassination, said Syrian leaders were very embarrassed because Mughniyeh appeared in their country and they were telling the entire international community that they did not have information about him.
Beirut's Al-Akhbar evaluates that the Syrian leadership is heading toward retaliation against all the Israeli aggressions that have taken place against it (the retaliatory air raid against the PFLP Ayn al-Sahib training camp in October 2003; the flights over the Syrian presidential palace in Latakia in June 2006 aimed at pressuring the Syrian leadership; and the September 2007 air raid against what Israel designated as a 'nuclear facility' in Dayr al-Zawr) and at a timing of its choosing, "even if this response leads to the outbreak of a Syrian-Israeli war."
Interestingly, the Beirut pro-Syrian Al-Diyar evaluated that there are two conflicting options: either a Iranian-Syrian political and security escalation allowing Hizbullah to execute a qualitative operation regardless of the nature of the subsequent Israel response, or taking advantage of the assassination for a more major political breakthrough leading to "a major deal that might expedite solutions in more than one direction."
Expected retaliation by Hezbollah for the assassination of Mughniyeh could tip Israeli/Syrian war
http://yalibnan.com/site/archives/2008/03/syria_is_ready.php
Lebanese sources have revealed that the Syrian army is reinforcing its military presence along the Lebanese-Syrian borders point from the western Bekaa valley area to Deir Al Ashaer.
The sources linked the military reinforcement to increased speculation inside and outside Lebanon about the possibility that Lebanon will be lured into a war with Israel, which could be triggered by Hezbollah in retaliation for the assassination of its commander Imad Mughniyeh.
The sources said Damascus action is aimed at preventing Israel from attacking the Syrian territory .
According to war analysts, any action by Israel will be in response to Hezbollah's attack on it or any place in the world. Israeli response the analysts say will have specific objectives in quality and quantity ... stressing that such operations will target all Hezbollah bases in the Western Bekaa, which have been strengthened after the war of July 2006.
The analysts said that the western Bekaa contains the main operations of the party, which were established with Iranian funds and include educational and medical institutions and service facilities, all of which will be the targeted by Israeli .
According to Lebanese sources, Hezbollah chief sayyed Hassan Nasrallah is reviewing carefully all the security and military organs of the party after the assassination of Mughniyeh, in preparation for the next battle with Israel . All of this is preparation is being done in coordination with Iran.
Lebanese experts believe that the options of war and peace are equal. Tipped one over another depends on the type of retaliation by Hezbollah for the assassination of Mughniyeh. The experts noted that the citizens of the south of Lebanon are now living in a state of panic and many have renewed their passports to flee if a new war breaks out.
According to Israeli intelligence sources Hezbollah has completed its military preparations in order to execute its retaliatory action against Israel and the countdown for such an operation has already started .
This is why the Israeli sources have pointed out is the reason why Tel Aviv has issued a warning to Damascus in which it holds the Syrian leadership responsible if Hezbollah launched any attacks on its territory or its interests around the world. The sources stresses this warning is a direct threat that Syria will be attacked if Israel is attacked from the Lebanese territory.
A British government source responded to a question about the possibility of an Israeli attack on Syria if Hezbollah attacked Israel, saying: "There is always a big danger of such a development if Israeli northern borders are attacked noting that this will be a catastrophe," . The source added " Hezbollah retaliation for the assassination of Mugniyeh could lead to a much wider regional conflict.
Syria's role in Assassinating Mughniyeh
Mughniyeh's widow, an Iranian national, who was in Damascus at the time her husband was assassinated accused the Syrian regime of involvement in the murder.
"The Syrian traitors assisted in my husband's murder," said Mughniyeh's widow.
She added "This is why the Syrian regime has refused the help of Iran and Hezbollah in the investigation of the murder."
Syria's Foreign Minister stated after the assassination that "only Syria will investigate the murder and it will be a very simple and straight forward investigation and we will find the perpetrators within days."
The General Secretariat of the Damascus Declaration also accused Monday the Syrian regime of involvement in the assassination of Mughniyeh
A statement issued by the Damascus Declaration headed by former MP Maamun al-Homsi stated: "It is our duty to expose the crimes of the Syrian regime and specifically the killing of Imad Mughniyeh and the deception that accompanied this crime."
The statement added the "Syrian intelligence removed the car in which Mughniyeh was assassinated and cleaned completely the scene of the murder to remove all the evidence."
According to intelligence reports Assef Shawkat, Syria's top intelligence chief and the brother-in-law of Syrian president Bashar al Assad is behind the assassination. Shawkat is married to Basha's sister Bushra. Bushra has left Syria and is now living in Paris.
The intelligence reports claim that Hezbollah has not retaliated earlier for Mughniyeh 's assassination, because it is currently investigating Syria 's role in the murder .
Hezbollah according to these reports has been questioning many Syrians in Lebanon who knew the whereabouts of Mughnieh before he left for Damascus where he was assassinated on February 12.
Abbas threatens to quit peace talks, revive Fatah terror
http://www.debka.com/headline.php?hid=5125
DEBKAfile’s Washington sources report that Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas has put President George W. Bush and secretary of state Condoleezza Rice on notice.
He has sent them a warning that he means to break off peace talks with Israel unless prime minister Ehud Olmert comes through with concessions by April. After that, he says, the Palestinians may weigh “alternative actions on the ground” – a transparent threat for his Fatah organization to revive the Palestinian “uprising” (terror campaign) against Israel from the West Bank.
DEBKAfile’s Palestinians sources note this is Abbas’ second threat to reignite the Palestinian-Israeli war launched by Yasser Arafat in 2000. Two weeks ago, he told the Jordanian A Dustour , that while he prefers negotiations for now, he does not exclude an alternative option in the future.
Our Washington sources disclose the Palestinian leader’s conditions for the dialogue to continue:
1. The Israeli prime minister must meet Palestinian demands for concessions.
2. Foreign minister Tzipi Livni must satisfy her Palestinian opposition number Ahmed Qureia’s demand for a final list of Israeli concessions on the core issues of borders, refugees, Jerusalem and water.
3. Israeli must halt all construction in Jerusalem and the settlements forthwith.
According to DEBKAfile’s Middle East sources, Abbas’s ultimatum was timed to profit from three forthcoming events:
First: US Vice President Dick Cheney’s visit on March 22. Palestinian officials will emphasize to him that they have run out of patience with Olmert and that some American arm-twisting is needed to make him more forthcoming.
Second: The forthcoming Arab League summit on March 29 in Damascus. Abbas is jockeying for a position that will upstage the Gaza issue, which is high on the summit’s agenda, and steal the thunder from radical Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal’s triumphal performance. For this, he needs a more radical platform than tame submission to the US-sponsored peace line.
Third: A fighting stance would pave the way for reconciliation talks with Hamas on the formation of a Palestinian unity government. This would be applauded by all the Arab rulers present. For Abbas, time is running out with his own people. A new Palestinian popularity poll in mid-March placed Hamas prime minister of Gaza Ismail Haniyeh in the lead - 47 percent to the PA chairman’s 46 percent. Significantly, Haniyeh gained 10 percent in popularity after Hamas smashed the Gaza-Egyptian border wall and escalated its missile onslaught on Israel.
Fourth: The Palestinian leader is under fire from his own followers for letting Israel celebrate its 60th year of statehood in May without discernible progress toward Palestinian independence. The resumption of a Fatah-dominated terror offensive to mar Israel’s anniversary events might quell the dissatisfaction with his leadership.
Abbas’ master plan for wrecking Israel’s 60th anniversary celebrations
http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=1341
DEBKAfile publishes here for the first time details of the Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ master plan for wrecking Israel’s 60th anniversary celebrations.
The project is called the “2008 Return”
The Palestinian leader has circulated guidelines for three million Palestinians to leave their homes on the West Bank, Gaza, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon on May 14 and march on Israel’s borders, including the Green Line.
The march is to take place a week after Israel’s Independence Day on May 8, 2008. If Israel obstructs their passage, they will strike camp and live in tents until Israel surrenders and lets them through.
This stunt will be accompanied by pressure from the Palestinian Authority on international organizations to force Israel to implement UN Resolution 194, passed by the General Assembly on Dec. 11, 1948.
DEBKAfile’s Middle East sources report that Abbas commissioned the “2008 Return” project from a special Fatah forum headed by Ziyad Abu Ain from Ramallah, deputy minister for Palestinian prisoners in the Salam Fayyad government and close associate of Marwan Barghouti, who is serving life for five terrorist murders.
Operation “2008 Return” is described in its introduction as a decision by the Palestinian people “to implement UN resolution (194), declare themselves holders of the UN blue banner, and return to their homeland, from which they were forcefully expelled [Jaffa, Haifa, Acre, Ramla, Lod, Ashkelon etc]… in order to live in peace and security with their Israeli neighbors.”
The introduction goes on to state: “Neither the Jews nor the international community can stand against the desire of the Palestinian people to exercise their right of return to their homeland and to their homes, land, holy places [Jerusalem] and heritage.”
DEBKAfile: Mahmoud Abbas incidentally lays claim to Christian as well as Muslim holy sites – therefore also Nazareth and the Sea of Galilee sites.
The introduction is followed by a set of instructions to Palestinian communities, of which seven are the most relevant:
1. All returnees must attach the UN resolution and refugee card on their chests.
2. All returnees must bring their tents and other goods with them.
If obstructed by Israeli forces from reaching their land, they must set up their tents on the border and stay there until Israel surrenders and allows them to cross.
The plan is to deploy hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in tent cities indefinitely on all of Israel’s borders.
3. Jewish friends are called upon to assist in resolving the Palestinian refugee problem.
4. Arab governments and friends all over the world are called on to support the logistics of the operation.
5. Palestinian holders of foreign citizenships, especially US and European, are to charter planes for flights to Israel or neighboring countries on May 14, 2008, as well reserving passage on tens of ships to dock at Israeli ports on this date.
6. Personal invitations will be extended to all world leaders for their support.
7. Kings and leaders of Islamic countries will be invited, as well as members of the Israeli government and Knesset. Special invitations will be sent to the US president and members of the Senate.
The document ends with an appeal to the Arab nation, especially the Saudi King Abdullah, to support the operation politically, diplomatically and materially.
DEBKAfile’s Palestinian sources report that Mahmoud Abbas intends to submit his ambitious master plan to the summit of Arab rulers meeting in Damascus March 29.
There is no knowing how much support he will win from Arab governments or whether the different Palestinian communities will rise to his call.
The whole plan may simply fold for lack of response – or not.
Abbas’ main objectives appear to be to upstage the warlike Hamas and throw a wet blanket over Israel’s anniversary celebrations.
Israel's New Best Friend? - Canada
http://www.thestar.com/comment/columnists/article/346766
A United Nations panel voted overwhelmingly this month to condemn Israel for a recent armed incursion in the Gaza Strip that claimed more than 120 lives, many of them civilian.
Thirty-three member countries of the 47-seat UN Human Rights Council endorsed the resolution, which accused Israel of war crimes in its ongoing battles against Palestinian militants in Gaza.
Those in favour of censuring the Jewish state included China, India and Russia. Thirteen countries abstained, among them seven European governments.
But one nation stood alone against the denunciation of Israel, and that country was not the United States – Israel's leading foreign supporter – or even Israel itself, for neither country has a seat on the human rights body.
Instead, the lone dissenter was Canada.
"We're very happy that we see things in a similar way," Carmela Shamir, deputy director of the North America division at Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said in an interview last week.
"Canada has adopted several times in recent months very brave positions."
People are beginning to take notice.
"There is a widespread impression that Canada's position is more pro-Israel than it has been in the past," said Peter Jones, an assistant professor of public and international affairs at the University of Ottawa.
"It is a bit of a departure."
A tilt toward Israel was becoming apparent under Liberal prime minister Paul Martin, said Jones, but the shift has become even more pronounced since Stephen Harper's Conservative government took power in Ottawa in 2006.
In January, for example, Canada announced it was pulling out of a UN anti-racism conference slated for next year in Durban, South Africa, out of concern the meeting could degenerate into a binge of Israel-bashing, which was what happened at a similar gathering there in 2001, in the view of some participants.
"Canada is interested in combating racism, not promoting it," Jason Kenney, secretary of state for multiculturalism and Canadian identity, said in January.
"We'll attend any conference that is opposed to racism and intolerance, not those that actually promote racism and intolerance."
Just one other country – Israel itself – has so far withdrawn from the Durban conference, but the Israelis waited until Feb. 25, a month after the Canadian decision, before announcing they, too, would be staying home.
"Dialogue between our two governments is very good, very open," said Shamir.
To a considerable degree, it always has been.
Like other Western governments, Ottawa has fully supported the existence of Israel since its creation in 1948, and there are close cultural, political, and social ties between the two countries.
Since 1997, Israel and Canada have had a free-trade agreement, and two-way commerce has more than doubled during that time.
But the moral and political complexities of the long-running Israeli-Palestinian conflict frequently oblige even Israel's most ardent backers – including the United States – to temper their support with sometimes blunt criticism.
During a visit here in January, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice spoke out clearly against continuing Israeli housing construction in East Jerusalem on land it annexed in 1967 and now occupies illegally in the eyes of most of the world.
But, only days later, on a visit of his own, Canada's Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier seemed to muddy Ottawa's position on the same issue by declining to express specific opposition to Israeli settlement activity in East Jerusalem.
Like the United States and Europe, Canada has traditionally drawn no distinction between Israeli housing construction in East Jerusalem and its settlements in the West Bank, opposing both.
Following Bernier's visit, however, some ambiguity seems to have crept into a once straightforward Canadian policy.
"The ambiguity raises questions," said Jones at the University of Ottawa. "I don't know what it means."
At least some other people think they do.
"I think the Harper government made a deliberate calculation," said Mohamed Boudjenane, executive director of the Canadian Arab Federation. "They are reaching out to the Jewish vote. I can't see any other reason."
Whatever its stance toward Israel, Ottawa has not abandoned the Palestinians.
Canada maintains a diplomatic office in Ramallah, the West Bank capital and disbursed $39 million in economic assistance to the Palestinian territories in the fiscal year 2006-07.
Canada fully supports the eventual establishment of an independent Palestinian state.
Maybe so, says Boudjenane, but Ottawa under Harper's leadership has nonetheless adopted a "negative" tone toward Arabs and Muslims.
For example, he said, the Canadian Arab Federation recently requested a meeting with Kenney to discuss Ottawa's decision to withdraw from next year's anti-racism meeting in South Africa. But they were refused.
"This is our government, too," he said. "You cannot decide to boycott one group."
Other observers see different factors at work in what they regard as Canada's increasingly forthright backing for Israel, the sole functioning democracy in a region of authoritarian Arab states.
"Most people you talk to tend to take the view it's an ideological feeling by the Harper government," said Jones, who attributes the shift largely to a personal decision by the Prime Minister and his immediate staff.
"Certainly, around Ottawa, there's a general feeling that the (Prime Minister's Office) and the (Privy Council Office) have taken a greater interest in this part of the world."
Shamir regards the change less as an overt show of support for her country and more as a reflection of shared principles.
"I would say this government, on issues like fighting the war on terror, has a similar analysis of global trends as the Israeli government has," she said.
"I would put it in terms, not of supporting Israel, but of taking positions concurrent with Israeli ones."
Whatever its cause, one test of Ottawa's shifting Middle Eastern vision is the practical effect it stands to achieve in a region of stubborn hostilities, great suffering, and abiding fears.
"In terms of just Canada, per se, it probably does not have that great an impact" said Jones.
"But it has a diplomatic and moral impact."
Shamir welcomed the apparent shift, even though it comes from a country that is not exactly a powerhouse of international influence.
"Canada is part of the G-8," she said. "It's taking part in the global war on terror. The size of the population is not relevant."
Israel concerned over Russia's continued supply of sophisticated weaponry to Syria and Iran, may reach Hezbollah
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/966667.html
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert expressed concern over Russia's continuing supply of sophisticated weaponry to Syria and Iran during a meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Jerusalem on Thursday.
Olmert stressed Israel's fear that these weapons, including advanced anti-tank weapons and anti-aircraft missiles, could find their way into the hands of the Lebanon-based guerilla group Hezbollah, supported by Syria and Iran, which has threatened to destroy Israel.
Lavrov responded by saying that Russia has no knowledge of Hezbollah possessing Russian weapons, and that if Israel has any information on the topic, Russia would be happy to look into it.
During the meeting between the two officials, the Russian minister mentioned the Middle East peace summit to be held in Moscow in the coming months as a follow-up to last November's U.S.-hosted Annapolis conference, which resumed peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians. Olmert, for his part, expressed doubts regarding the summit, saying "we must examine whether such a summit will serve the negotiations with the Palestinians, and only then to decide."
Lavrov inquired whether Israel would be willing to hold talks with Syria if Moscow were to mediate. "I am ready to begin a diplomatic process with Syria only if they distance themselves from the axis of evil and stop supporting Hamas and Hezbollah," Olmert said in response.
While visiting Syria earlier Thursday, Lavrov announced that the Moscow summit would aim to relaunch peace talks between Israel and Syria, and that the issue of the Golan Heights would definitely be on the summit's agenda. Israel captured the Golan from Syria in 1967 and Syria demands that the territory be returned as one of the conditions for peace.
Lavrov also met with President Shimon Peres on Thursday, shortly before his meeting with Olmert. Peres told the visiting Russian minister that "talk of peace from Syria arouses distrust within Israel."
According to Peres, Syria is smuggling massive amounts of weapons to Hezbollah.
Lavrov said that peace in the Middle East will be possible only within the framework of a comprehensive peace agreement between Israel and all its Arab neighbors, alongside a solution of all internal issues between Israel and the Palestinians. "There is already a UN resolution, there is the road map and Russia is very interested in advancing the Annapolis process forward," Lavrov said.
After his meetings with Peres and Olmert, Lavrov assured Israel that Russia's Middle East policy will remain the same under President Dmitry Medvedev. He was elected this month to replace Vladimir Putin, who will stay on as Russia's prime minister.
Lavrov said Israel and Russia have some common goals, like fighting terrorism.
Lavrov arrived in Israel Thursday after visiting Syria. After meeting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus, Lavrov announced the upcoming peace summit, and said "we have not issued invitations but we're working out how to incorporate different suggestions."
Lavrov had announced plans to host the next Middle East peace conference after the Annapolis talks in November. He said on Thursday that everyone in Annapolis had agreed to the Moscow conference.
Russia's foreign minister also met members of the exiled leadership of the Palestinian militant group Hamas in Damascus before flying to Israel.
Sergei Kiprichenko, Russia's ambassador to Syria, said Lavrov's meetings in Israel would try to nail down a more specific date for the conference.
"We are definitely talking about holding it this year. The Israeli-Syrian peace track is guaranteed to be on the agenda. Syria is very interested and is making efforts for the conference to succeed," he said.
Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem said Syria would attend the Moscow meeting, although Israeli strikes against Gaza made it difficult for peace talks with Israel to resume.
"Syria cannot be absent from a major meeting that would discuss the Golan. But it does not make sense to restart the talks with Israeli massacres taking place in Gaza. An atmosphere has to be created first," Moallem said.
Syria agreed to attend the Annapolis conference only after a session devoted to the Syrian-Israeli peace track was included. No direct talks between the two countries took place at the meeting.
Peace talks between Syria and Israel collapsed in 2000 over the extent of a proposed Israeli withdrawal from the Golan, a plateau overlooking Damascus that Israel captured in 1967.
Tension between Syria and Israel have risen since then, with Syria dismissing Israeli demands to abandon support for Hamas and the Lebanese guerilla group Hezbollah, which fought a war with Israel in 2006. Damascus also wants an Israeli commitment to withdraw fully from the Golan.
Israeli planes raided a military installation in Syria in September. The target was described by a number of Western analysts as a nuclear facility. Syria said the complex was a conventional military building under construction.
Diplomats in Damascus said Israel and Syria have since exchanged messages, mainly through Turkey, which have not advanced prospects for resuming peace talks.
Diplomats said one of the messages was a warning from Israel that it would strike Syria again if Hezbollah fired rockets into Israel in retaliation for the killing of a Hezbollah commander in Damascus in February. Hezbollah blamed Israel for the assassination of its top military operative Imad Mughniyah. Israel denied the accusation and Syria has kept a low profile about the issue.
Moscow was Syria's strongest backer in its struggle with Israel during the Communist era, but Russia has more recently been improving ties with Israel. Russia advised Syria not seek action against Israel at the United Nations Security Council after the Israeli raid on its territory.
Cheney Affirms Israel's 'Right to Defend Itself Always'
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,340651,00.html
JERUSALEM — Vice President Dick Cheney said Saturday the U.S. has an "enduring and unshakable" commitment to Israel's security and its right to defend itself against those bent on destroying the Jewish state.
At the start of a weekend of talks with Israeli and Palestinian leaders, Cheney also said the Bush administration wants to see a "new beginning" for the Palestinian people and is committed to pursuing a Mideast peace deal.
Cheney's visit is part of the U.S. strategy to keep the pressure on the two sides, despite recent bloodshed, to agree on a framework for peace before President Bush leaves office in January.
"America's commitment to Israel's security is enduring and unshakable, as is our commitment to Israel's right to defend itself always against terrorism, rocket attacks and other forces dedicated to Israel's destruction," Cheney told reporters before an evening meeting with Israel's prime minister, Ehud Olmert.
"America's commited to moving the process forward," Cheney said. But, he said, "it is not America's role to dictate the outcome." The U.S. wants to see a resolution to the conflict and will provide support and encouragement to help make that happen.
He made direct mention of parts of the Middle East where, the U.S. believes, efforts are under way to foment violence and undermine stability in the region.
"As we continue to work to peace, we must not and will not ignore the darkening shadows of the situations in Gaza, in Lebanon, in Syria and in Iran and the forces there that are working to derail the hopes of the world," Cheney said.
Speaking of the strong U.S. ally, Cheney said America "will never pressure Israel to take steps that threatens its security."
Cheney, who just wrapped up two days of meetings in Saudi Arabia, planned to attend an Easter service Sunday in Jerusalem, then go to Ramallah in the West Bank for talks with the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas.
Cheney resurrects military option against Iran in Gulf tour
http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=1342
“Iran has got to be very high on that list,” said a senior aide ahead of the talks US Vice President Dick Cheney will hold during his 10-day tour of the Middle East and Turkey, which began Monday, March 17 in Iraq.
Singling out Oman, the aide noted that the US and Oman are co-guardians of the strategic Strait of Hormuz.
“The Omanis, like a lot of other people,” he said “are concerned by the escalating tensions between the rest of the world community and Iran and by some of Iran’s activities, particularly in the nuclear field, but outside its borders as well.”
According to DEBKAfile, the official was referring to Tehran’s meddling in Iraq, Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.
Our military, Washington and Gulf sources report that US Vice President Dick Cheney is again talking about possible US military action to shut down Iran’s covert nuclear program.
Cheney stopped over in Oman Wednesday, Wed. March 19, after two days in Iraq. He will travel next to Saudi Arabia, is due in Jerusalem next Saturday and will also visit Ramallah and Turkey.
Our sources report exclusively that his talks are focusing on two aspects of the Iranian nuclear threat:
1. The Bush administration’s decision to distance itself from the National Intelligence Estimate released last December. Its conclusion that Iran’s nuclear arms program was shelved in 2003, which rendered America’s military option superfluous, is now deemed a mistake.
2. The administration now buys British, German, French and Israeli intelligence estimates that Iran is indeed pressing forward with programs for building nuclear weapons, warheads and ballistic missiles for their delivery.
The vice president will listen closely to his hosts’ ideas about joint efforts for containing Iran’s aggressive expansionist thrusts across the Persian Gulf and Middle East and halting its progress towards nuclear armaments.
The vice president’s choice of capitals for his tour is a pointer to the fact that the military option, off since December, may be on again. America will need the cooperation of all four - Oman, Saudi Arabia, Israel and Turkey - to mount a military attack on Iran.
Oman hosts the big American air bases which are the core of the defense shield for the Strait of Hormuz and for the US Navy, Marine and Air Force units deployed in the Persian Gulf.
Saudi Arabia is the senior Gulf and Arabian trendsetter and the key to pan-Arab endorsement for a US offensive against Tehran. Riyadh has opposed military action until now.
Israel is the only regional nation willing to actively participate in an attack on Iran’s nuclear sites; its military has been putting together plans for going it alone.
Last week, our sources report, Jerusalem was notified by the White House that the Iranian issue had been added to Cheney’s regional agenda at the last minute; his hosts were requested to prepare themselves for exhaustive and lengthy discussions on Iran with the vice president and his aides.
Israel’s defense cabinet was accordingly convened last Wednesday – officially to scrutinize the armed forces’ forward planning and applications of the Lebanon war inquiry panel’s recommendations.
But, our military sources report, the ministers were convened to decide which of Israel’s military plans of action were to be presented to Cheney.
Turkey is a pivotal element in any war plan because American warplanes and missiles heading for Iran will have to transit its airspace and take off from air bases on its soil.
The US and Turkey have improved their military relations since they worked together against PKK havens in northern Iraq last February.
The vice president’s Iraq visit marked the fifth anniversary of the US invasion.
While there, he made it clear that the US was in no hurry to pull out of the country before its mission was completed and would not allow the country to become a staging ground for terrorist attacks on Americans.
In his talks with Iraq leaders, he hammered out military and political plans to bridge the 10 months remaining until a new president takes office in Washington.
After talking to Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki, the US leader flew north to meet with Kurdish leader Masoud Barzani in the Kurdish capital of Irbil.
In particular, he sought progress on Iraq’s oil law which is held up by disagreements between Kurds and Arab Sunni leaders.
Fact or Fiction? World leaders raise new concerns over possible coming nuclear attacks
http://www.joelrosenberg.blogspot.com/
Dead Heat launched yesterday and became the #1 thriller on Amazon. But while it's fiction, the threat of rogue states and/or terrorist groups trying to launch nuclear attacks against the U.S. and our allies is all too real.
Indeed, in the last twenty-four hours, the leaders of Germany and Great Britain have expressed new concerns over possible coming nuclear attacks. Neither suggested having intelligence indicating such attacks were close at hand, but their warnings turned heads on several continents.
They also echoed concerns raised by American national security leaders over the past year, including Vice President Dick Cheney, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, and former CIA Director George Tenet.
On a tour through the Middle East this week, Sen. John McCain also warned of the growing nuclear threat from Iran and further warned that Hamas, Hezbollah and other terror groups could be planning to strike not only Israel but the U.S. and Europe as well.
For starters, consider this morning's headline out of London: "Britain faces a rising threat of nuclear attack, says Gordon Brown."
"Gordon Brown faces accusations of scaremongering today with claims that Britain faces a rising threat of nuclear attack," reports the Mirror. "The Prime Minister will tell the Commons that an increasing number of rogue states are getting nuclear weapons. And he will warn there are more and more terrorist groups trying to get 'dirty bombs,' which can spread radioactive material over vast areas....He will also say the chance of a pandemic flu, which could kill millions, is high and problems of droughts and floods from global warming will rise. He will add that protecting electronic systems from the threat of computer warfare will be a priority. Mr Brown is also expected to announce plans to set up a US-style National Security Council."
Then consider this headline: "Merkel: Ahmadinejad's Nuclear Ambitions 'a Major Threat' To The World."
"Speaking in the Israel Parliament, German Chancellor Angela Merkel warned that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's nuclear ambitions pose 'a major threat' not only to Israel, but to the world as well," according to news reports out of Jerusalem. "Merkel, who became the first German Chancellor to address Israel's parliament, the Knesset on Tuesday....'It is not the world that has to prove that Iran is building a bomb, rather, Iran has to prove to the world that it does not want the nuclear bomb,' Merkel told Israeli leaders. The German Chancellor also denounced Ahmedinejad's challenge to Israel's right to exist as a sovereign nation. She also made it clear that Germany would support further sanctions on Iran if it fails to provide clear evidence supporting Ahmadinejad's assertion that his country's nuclear program is intended for peaceful purposes only. Merkel, leader of a nation that was responsible for kill! ing 6 million Jews during World War II, said in a tone of confession that 'the Holocaust fills us with shame....'I bow my head before the survivors and I bow my head before you in tribute to the fact that you were able to survive," Merkel said. She vowed to battle 'any flare-ups of anti-Semitism, racism and xenophobia in Germany or in Europe.'"
Then came this headline: "John McCain: Israel's enemies threaten us all."
"I think Iran is a threat to the region," said Sen. McCain, noting that Iran is "obviously pursuing nuclear weapons....At the end of the day, we can still not afford to have Iran with nuclear weapons...We know they have ambitions that are not just aimed at the State of Israel." He added that these ambitions included "destabilisation of the entire region upon which the United States' national security interests rest."
What's more, McCain warned that, "If Hamas and Hizbollah succeeds here in Israel, they are going to succeed everywhere, not only in the Middle East, but everywhere. Israel isn't the only enemy."
Meanwhile, there is this headline out of Geneva: "North Korea, U.S. Fail to Reach Accord on Nuclear Declaration."
"Nuclear disarmament talks with North Korea remain deadlocked after U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill failed to persuade the communist nation to disclose its atomic program," reported Bloomberg News. "'We did not reach an agreement that will allow us to move forward,'' Hill told reporters in Geneva late yesterday after about eight hours of talks with his North Korean counterpart Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye Gwan. 'There is no question that we need to move faster.' Hill said he and Kim hadn't scheduled further talks and must report back to their governments. International negotiations, also involving South Korea, Russia, China and Japan, have been stalled since Kim Jong Il's regime missed a Dec. 31 deadline to provide a complete and accurate declaration of its atomic programs and materials."
Such international concerns over possible nuclear attacks echo warnings issued by several U.S. security officials over the past year or so, including:
* "Cheney: Nuclear attack 'a very real threat'" (April 16, 2007)
* "Chertoff: We're Preparing for Nuclear Attack" (September 10, 2007).
* "Tenet: Al-Qaida's Nuclear Threat Real" (April 30, 2007)
The point is not that such apocalyptic attacks against the U.S., Europe, Israel or elsewhere are imminent or necessarily destined to come to pass. The point is that a growing number of world leaders believe such threats are real and significant. We should not take their warnings lightly. Dead Heat is a fictional scenario, looking at how such horrors could unfold. Let's pray they never do. Hopefully, our nation's political, military, intelligence and law enforcement leaders will have the necessary wisdom, courage, and sense of urgency to counter and neutralize these threats, and many others like them, in time.
U.S. Adapts Cold-War Idea to Fight Terrorists
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/18/washington/18terror.html?hp
In the days immediately after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, members of President Bush’s war cabinet declared that it would be impossible to deter the most fervent extremists from carrying out even more deadly terrorist missions with biological, chemical or nuclear weapons.
Since then, however, administration, military and intelligence officials assigned to counterterrorism have begun to change their view. After piecing together a more nuanced portrait of terrorist organizations, they say there is reason to believe that a combination of efforts could in fact establish something akin to the posture of deterrence, the strategy that helped protect the United States from a Soviet nuclear attack during the cold war.
Interviews with more than two dozen senior officials involved in the effort provided the outlines of previously unreported missions to mute Al Qaeda’s message, turn the jihadi movement’s own weaknesses against it and illuminate Al Qaeda’s errors whenever possible.
A primary focus has become cyberspace, which is the global safe haven of terrorist networks. To counter efforts by terrorists to plot attacks, raise money and recruit new members on the Internet, the government has mounted a secret campaign to plant bogus e-mail messages and Web site postings, with the intent to sow confusion, dissent and distrust among militant organizations, officials confirm.
At the same time, American diplomats are quietly working behind the scenes with Middle Eastern partners to amplify the speeches and writings of prominent Islamic clerics who are renouncing terrorist violence.
At the local level, the authorities are experimenting with new ways to keep potential terrorists off guard.
In New York City, as many as 100 police officers in squad cars from every precinct converge twice daily at randomly selected times and at randomly selected sites, like Times Square or the financial district, to rehearse their response to a terrorist attack. City police officials say the operations are believed to be a crucial tactic to keep extremists guessing as to when and where a large police presence may materialize at any hour. “What we’ve developed since 9/11, in six or seven years, is a better understanding of the support that is necessary for terrorists, the network which provides that support, whether it’s financial or material or expertise,” said Michael E. Leiter, acting director of the National Counterterrorism Center.
“We’ve now begun to develop more sophisticated thoughts about deterrence looking at each one of those individually,” Mr. Leiter said in an interview. “Terrorists don’t operate in a vacuum.”
In some ways, government officials acknowledge, the effort represents a second-best solution. Their preferred way to combat terrorism remains to capture or kill extremists, and the new emphasis on deterrence in some ways amounts to attaching a new label to old tools.
“There is one key question that no one can answer: How much disruption does it take to give you the effect of deterrence?” said Michael Levi, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and the author of a new book, “On Nuclear Terrorism.”
The New Deterrence
The emerging belief that terrorists may be subject to a new form of deterrence is reflected in two of the nation’s central strategy documents.
The 2002 National Security Strategy, signed by the president one year after the Sept. 11 attacks, stated flatly that “traditional concepts of deterrence will not work against a terrorist enemy whose avowed tactics are wanton destruction and the targeting of innocents.”
Four years later, however, the National Strategy for Combating Terrorism concluded: “A new deterrence calculus combines the need to deter terrorists and supporters from contemplating a W.M.D. attack and, failing that, to dissuade them from actually conducting an attack.”
For obvious reasons, it is harder to deter terrorists than it was to deter a Soviet attack.
Terrorists hold no obvious targets for American retaliation as Soviet cities, factories, military bases and silos were under the cold-war deterrence doctrine. And it is far harder to pinpoint the location of a terrorist group’s leaders than it was to identify the Kremlin offices of the Politburo bosses, making it all but impossible to deter attacks by credibly threatening a retaliatory attack.
But over the six and a half years since the Sept. 11 attacks, many terrorist leaders, including Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, have successfully evaded capture, and American officials say they now recognize that threats to kill terrorist leaders may never be enough to keep America safe.
So American officials have spent the last several years trying to identify other types of “territory” that extremists hold dear, and they say they believe that one important aspect may be the terrorists’ reputation and credibility with Muslims.
Under this theory, if the seeds of doubt can be planted in the mind of Al Qaeda’s strategic leadership that an attack would be viewed as a shameful murder of innocents — or, even more effectively, that it would be an embarrassing failure — then the order may not be given, according to this new analysis.
Senior officials acknowledge that it is difficult to prove what role these new tactics and strategies have played in thwarting plots or deterring Al Qaeda from attacking. Senior officials say there have been several successes using the new approaches, but many involve highly classified technical programs, including the cyberoperations, that they declined to detail.
They did point to some older and now publicized examples that suggest that their efforts are moving in the right direction.
George J. Tenet, the former director of the Central Intelligence Agency, wrote in his autobiography that the authorities were concerned that Qaeda operatives had made plans in 2003 to attack the New York City subway using cyanide devices.
Mr. Zawahri reportedly called off the plot because he feared that it “was not sufficiently inspiring to serve Al Qaeda’s ambitions,” and would be viewed as a pale, even humiliating, follow-up to the 9/11 attacks.
And in 2002, Iyman Faris, a naturalized American citizen from Kashmir, began casing the Brooklyn Bridge to plan an attack and communicated with Qaeda leaders in Pakistan via coded messages about using a blowtorch to sever the suspension cables.
But by early 2003, Mr. Faris sent a message to his confederates saying that “the weather is too hot.” American officials said that meant Mr. Faris feared that the plot was unlikely to succeed — apparently because of increased security.
“We made a very visible presence there and that may have contributed to it,” said Paul J. Browne, the New York City Police Department’s chief spokesman. “Deterrence is part and parcel of our entire effort.”
Disrupting Cyberprojects
Terrorists hold little or no terrain, except on the Web. “Al Qaeda and other terrorists’ center of gravity lies in the information domain, and it is there that we must engage it,” said Dell L. Dailey, the State Department’s counterterrorism chief.
Some of the government’s most secretive counterterrorism efforts involve disrupting terrorists’ cyberoperations. In Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, specially trained teams have recovered computer hard drives used by terrorists and are turning the terrorists’ tools against them.
“If you can learn something about whatever is on those hard drives, whatever that information might be, you could instill doubt on their part by just countermessaging whatever it is they said they wanted to do or planned to do,” said Brig. Gen. Mark O. Schissler, director of cyberoperations for the Air Force and a former deputy director of the antiterrorism office for the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Since terrorists feel safe using the Internet to spread ideology and gather recruits, General Schissler added, “you may be able to interfere with some of that, interrupt some of that.”
“You can also post messages to the opposite of that,” he added.
Other American efforts are aimed at discrediting Qaeda operations, including the decision to release seized videotapes showing members of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a largely Iraqi group with some foreign leaders, training children to kidnap and kill, as well as a lengthy letter said to have been written by another terrorist leader that describes the organization as weak and plagued by poor morale.
Dissuading Militants
Even as security and intelligence forces seek to disrupt terrorist operations, counterterrorism specialists are examining ways to dissuade insurgents from even considering an attack with unconventional weapons. They are looking at aspects of the militants’ culture, families or religion, to undermine the rhetoric of terrorist leaders.
For example, the government is seeking ways to amplify the voices of respected religious leaders who warn that suicide bombers will not enjoy the heavenly delights promised by terrorist literature, and that their families will be dishonored by such attacks. Those efforts are aimed at undermining a terrorist’s will.
“I’ve got to figure out what does dissuade you,” said Lt. Gen. John F. Sattler, the Joint Chiefs’ director of strategic plans and policy. “What is your center of gravity that we can go at? The goal you set won’t be achieved, or you will be discredited and lose face with the rest of the Muslim world or radical extremism that you signed up for.”
Efforts are also under way to persuade Muslims not to support terrorists. It is a delicate campaign that American officials are trying to promote and amplify — but without leaving telltale American fingerprints that could undermine the effort in the Muslim world. Senior Bush administration officials point to several promising developments.
Saudi Arabia’s top cleric, Grand Mufti Sheik Abdul Aziz al-Asheik, gave a speech last October warning Saudis not to join unauthorized jihadist activities, a statement directed mainly at those considering going to Iraq to fight the American-led forces.
And Abdul-Aziz el-Sherif, a top leader of the armed Egyptian movement Islamic Jihad and a longtime associate of Mr. Zawahri, the second-ranking Qaeda official, has just completed a book that renounces violent jihad on legal and religious grounds.
Such dissents are serving to widen rifts between Qaeda leaders and some former loyal backers, Western and Middle Eastern diplomats say.
“Many terrorists value the perception of popular or theological legitimacy for their actions,” said Stephen J. Hadley, Mr. Bush’s national security adviser. “By encouraging debate about the moral legitimacy of using weapons of mass destruction, we can try to affect the strategic calculus of the terrorists.”
Denying Support
As the top Pentagon policy maker for special operations, Michael G. Vickers creates strategies for combating terrorism with specialized military forces, as well as for countering the proliferation of nuclear, biological or chemical weapons.
Much of his planning is old school: how should the military’s most elite combat teams capture and kill terrorists? But with each passing day, more of his time is spent in the new world of terrorist deterrence theory, trying to figure out how to prevent attacks by persuading terrorist support networks — those who enable terrorists to operate — to refuse any kind of assistance to stateless agents of extremism.
“Obviously, hard-core terrorists will be the hardest to deter,” Mr. Vickers said. “But if we can deter the support network — recruiters, financial supporters, local security providers and states who provide sanctuary — then we can start achieving a deterrent effect on the whole terrorist network and constrain terrorists’ ability to operate.
“We have not deterred terrorists from their intention to do us great harm,” Mr. Vickers said, “but by constraining their means and taking away various tools, we approach the overall deterrent effect we want.”
Much effort is being spent on perfecting technical systems that can identify the source of unconventional weapons or their components regardless of where they are found — and letting nations around the world know the United States has this ability.
President Bush has declared that the United States will hold “fully accountable” any nation that shares nuclear weapons with another state or terrorists.
Rear Adm. William P. Loeffler, deputy director of the Center for Combating Weapons of Mass Destruction at the military’s Strategic Command, said Mr. Bush’s declaration meant that those who might supply arms or components to terrorists were just as accountable as those who ordered and carried out an attack.
It is, the admiral said, a system of “attribution as deterrence.”
Muslims nations: Defame Islam, get sued?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080314/ap_on_re_af/islamic_summit_islamophobia
The Muslim world has created a battle plan to defend its religion from political cartoonists.
Concerned about what they see as a rise in the defamation of Islam, leaders of the world's Muslim nations are considering taking legal action against those that slight their religion or its sacred symbols. It was a key issue during a two-day summit that ended Friday in this western Africa capital.
The Muslim leaders are attempting to demand redress from nations like Denmark, which allowed the publication of cartoons portraying the Prophet Muhammad in 2006 and again last month, to the fury of the Muslim world.
Though the legal measures being considered have not been spelled out, the idea pits many Muslims against principles of freedom of speech enshrined in the constitutions of numerous Western governments.
"I don't think freedom of expression should mean freedom from blasphemy," said Senegal's President Abdoulaye Wade, the chairman of the 57-member Organization of the Islamic Conference. "There can be no freedom without limits."
Delegates were given a voluminous report by the OIC that recorded anti-Islamic speech and actions from around the world. The report concludes that Islam is under attack and that a defense must be mounted.
"Muslims are being targeted by a campaign of defamation, denigration, stereotyping, intolerance and discrimination," charged Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, the secretary general of the group.
The report urges the creation of a "legal instrument" to crack down on defamation of Islam. Some delegates point to laws in Europe criminalizing the denial of the Holocaust and other anti-Semitic rhetoric. They also point to articles within various U.N. charters that condemn discrimination based on religion and argue that these should be ramped up.
"In our relation with the western world, we are going through a difficult time," Ihsanoglu told the summit's general assembly. "Islamophobia cannot be dealt with only through cultural activities but through a robust political engagement."
The International Humanist and Ethical Union in Geneva released a statement accusing the Islamic states of attempting to limit freedom of expression and of attempting to misuse the U.N.
Human Rights Watch said in a statement that objectionable depictions of the Prophet Muhammad do not "give them the right under international human rights law to insist that others abide by their views."
Hemayet Uddin, the lead author of the OIC report and head of cultural affairs for the group said legal action is needed because "this Islamophobia that we see in the world has gone far beyond a phobia. It is now at the level of hatred, of xenophobia, and we need to act."
A new charter drafted by the OIC commits the Muslim body "to protect and defend the true image of Islam" and "to combat the defamation of Islam."
To protect the faith, Muslim nations have created an "observatory" that meets regularly to monitor Islamophobia. It examines lectures and workshops taking place around the world and prints a monthly record of offensive content.
Libyan leader opens huge mosque in Uganda in bid to spread Islam through Africa
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/03/19/africa/AF-GEN-Uganda-Gadhafis-African-Quest.php
In his drive to spread Libyan and Islamic influence in Africa, Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi inaugurated a huge new mosque in this predominantly Christian country Wednesday, with several African heads of states attending and scores of Arab journalists flown in for the occasion.
Packed in Kampala's soccer stadium, a crowd estimated at 10,000 to 15,000 chanted "long live Brother Gadhafi" before the Libyan leader delivered an hour-long lecture on the meaning of Islam.
Gadhafi, who celebrates the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad a day earlier than most Sunni Muslims, had chosen the religious holiday to inaugurate the huge new Gadhafi National Mosque, which is touted by Libyan officials as Africa's second-largest.
"Muhammad is everybody's prophet. He was sent to all mankind, unlike the other prophets before him," Gadhafi told the rally, which included brass-bands and neatly uniformed schoolchildren, who waived Gadhafi posters along with organizers of the "World Islamic Call Society" — all wearing T-shirts of the Libyan leader.
A half dozen African heads of state, including Kenya's Mwai Kibaki, Gabon's Omar Bongo and Rwanda's Paul Kagame, joined Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni to greet the Libyan leader, who was the driving force behind creation of the African Union and wields considerable influence both with African governments and rebel movements.
"He who doesn't accept Islam in the end will be a loser," Gadhafi said in Arabic in a speech simultaneously translated into English, while Museveni, a born-again Protestant Christian, sat frowning by his side.
Fewer than 20 percent of Uganda's 30 million population are Muslim. Kalfan M'barak, a medical doctor in the crowd, said his ancestors had converted "generations ago" through contact with Arab and Muslim merchants. "There is absolutely no friction here. You can find two religions inside one family."
Ugandan religious tolerance was on display as heads of state and guests, regardless of their creed, crammed into the new mosque to celebrate.
"I congratulate you for the birthday of Muhammad. I didn't realize" ... that Muslims celebrate the equivalent of Christmas," Museveni said during a brief ceremony inside the mosque.
The complex, which is Uganda's biggest building, can accommodate more than 30,000 people and took more than 30 years to complete, religious officials say. Gadhafi began funding construction in 2001, but officials would not say how much he paid.
"It was the president of Uganda who asked us to build the mosque, and schools for Muslims," said Ahmed Gadhaf al-Dam, Gadhafi's cousin and close aide. "Helping Ugandans is part of the leader's continued efforts for inter-African solidarity."
But some in the crowd found the Libyan presence overbearing, complaining that Gadhafi's large security detail controlled the whole event. At one point, Libyan security guards scuffled with their Ugandan counterparts and bodyguards of the Rwandan president, until senior officials intervened.
Dozens of sheiks, tribal and religious leaders were brought here for the event from as far away as Pakistan and Malaysia.
"We came here on the invitation of the 'guide of the revolution,' he sent one of his special planes to fetch us," said Gibrila Yayah, the king of the Sonrai, an important nomad tribe on Mali's border with Algeria.
Sheik Imad Essawi, a leader of a Bedouin tribe from Iraq, said it was his first time in Africa.
"It's not as hot as southern Iraq in summer," he said. Like most of Gadhafi's guests, he was wearing his traditional tribal costume. Organizers also handed out baseball caps with the Libyan leader's image to the 80 Arab journalists flown-in from Cairo on a special plane.
Islam is on the rise throughout sub-Saharan Africa, and some of the chiefs lauded Gadhafi's efforts to promote their religion with Black Africans.
"It's great, there's lots of people here to celebrate," said Sherif Abidine Kouta, who said he'd been invited because his nomadic Arab tribe had helped introduce Islam into West Africa. "For them, it is the beginning of their learning."
Nearby, 8-year-old Dragilio Nangera and 13-year-old Mark Santong were performing a traditional African skit dance while chants of "Allahu Akbar," or God is Great, blasted through the microphones at the stadium.
"I'm not Muslim, but this is great fun," Santong said.
BLASPHEMY!--Christians React to Muslim's Cross-Less Jesus Film
http://www.christianpost.com/article/20080321/31609_Christians_React_to_Muslim%27s_Cross-Less_Jesus_Film_.htm
A new film on Jesus, told from the Islamic perspective, has drawn mixed reactions from the Christian community over its claim that Jesus did not die on the cross but was replaced by Judas Iscariot.
“The Messiah” – written, produced and directed by Iranian filmmaker Nader Talebzadeh - was filmed in the Islamic Republic of Iran with Iranian actors to portray how Muslims understand the life of Jesus based on the teachings of the Qur’an and the Gospel of Barnabas – a book not included in the Christian Bible and in which the Prophet Mohammed appears.
The movie features two endings – the Muslim and Christian version of Jesus and the cross – and has won an award at Rome’s Religion Today Film Festival for generating interfaith dialogue.
Dr. Emir Caner, dean of the College at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and a former devout Muslim, recommends Christians to view both versions of the crucifixion account and ask themselves several questions:
• When was Jesus replaced, according to the Qur’an?
• Why did the disciples not recognize that the man they were following was replaced before the cross
• Why did the mother of Christ not recognize that her son was not present on the Cross
• What was the alleged purpose of Allah in deceiving the crowd, including the disciples and Mary, into thinking Christ was being crucified
Caner, who is also a professor of history, said he believes that in the end the film should be welcomed.
“Perhaps Muslims and Christians will recognize that the Qur’an only offers sparse speculation into one of the most noted events in history while the Bible gives meticulous detail into the historic events of the day,” Caner wrote to The Christian Post in an email Thursday. “It is a new day when the public is once again willing to discuss religious issues with eternal significance.”
For most of “The Messiah,” Jesus is depicted similarly to versions made in the West – light complexion, brown hair and performing miracles, according to Variety magazine. But where the Muslim version diverges is at the end where the disciple Judas Iscariot miraculously transforms into the likeness of Jesus and is crucified in his place.
“He (Jesus) is not the son of God and was never the son of God. He is a prophet and he was not crucified, that somebody was crucified in his stead,” Talebzadeh claimed, according to CNN.
The director said his goal in making the film was to show both Muslims and Christians their common and different beliefs in Jesus and to generate conversation between the two groups who in recent years have been pitted against each other.
“When you show this information (Christian view of Jesus) to the common people, they don't know. Ninety percent of the Muslims in Iran don’t know about this,” Talebzadeh said.
Dr. Gary R. Habermas, distinguished research professor and chair of the department of Philosophy and Theology at Liberty University, said he has not seen the film but commented that Islam is “very respectful” of Jesus. He noted that the Koran has almost 100 verses on Jesus.
“The bad news is he is not the son of God, he didn’t die on the cross and because he didn’t die, he didn’t rise from the dead,” Habermas said to The Christian Post. “The good news is he is a great prophet, he is sinless, he is virgin born and he did miracles.”
Habermas, who recently returned from a debate with a Muslim in England, said the idea that Jesus did not die on the cross for the salvation of mankind is based on surah 4:157-158 that says Jesus was not crucified.
He emphasized that the Qur’an does not say that Judas took Jesus’ place but only that he was not crucified. The interpretation of Judas dying in place of Jesus is only one of several popular Muslim explanations for why Jesus did not die on the cross.
But not all Christians are happy with the film. One blogger, who goes by the pen name “Dan Goldfinch” in his web log at WordPress.com, argues that not only the Bible but history also declares that Jesus was crucified.
“Jesus didn’t come to earth for mere respect,” wrote the Ohio-based preacher. “If Jesus has not been crucified then he has not been resurrected. If Jesus has not been resurrected from the dead, then Christians are without hope. We may as well party it up if Christ has not been Resurrected from the dead.”
Goldfinch further said that what the Qur’an does not understand and explain is that man’s sin must be dealt with and if it is “not dealt with in the death of Christ then we, and all of humanity from the beginning until the end, are simply obligated to be 100 percent obedient to the law.”
“So if there is no death of Christ as this man is purporting in his film, then exactly how will we be saved from our sins?” the Christian blogger asked.
Director Talebzadeh meanwhile sees the film as an Islamic response to “The Passion of the Christ,” the 2004 blockbuster of self-professed Catholic Mel Gibson. Although the Iranian filmmaker praised Gibson’s movie, he said it was “wrong.”
“The Messiah,” with over 1,000 actors and extras, was one of the largest film productions in Iran, according to Variety magazine. It is the first movie to portray Jesus both from the Muslim and Christian perspective.
The film has already been released in Iran and will soon be available on the Internet, according to CNN.
Iran considers death penalty to stop flow of converts from Islam to Christianity
http://www.adnkronos.com/AKI/English/Religion/?id=1.0.1988866222
In its first session since last week's general elections, the new Iranian parliament is expected to discuss a law that will condemn to death anyone who decides to leave the Muslim faith and convert to other religions.
The parliament, also known as the Majlis, will debate the new law which has been presented by the government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Under the proposed law, anyone who is born to Muslim parents and decides to convert to another faith, will face the death penalty.
Currently converts, particularly those who have decided to leave the Muslim faith for Evangelical churches, are arrested and then released after some years of detention.
The new legislation, which has caused concern in Iran and abroad, was proposed mainly because of fears of proselytising activities by Evangelical churches particularly through the use of satellite channels.
There has also been concern over fact that many young people in Iran have abandoned Islam because they're tired of the many restrictions imposed by the faith.
According to unofficial sources, in the past five years, one million Iranians, particularly young people and women, have abandoned Islam and joined Evangelical churches.
This phenomenon has surprised even the missionaries who carry out their activities in secret in Iran.
An Evangelical priest and former Muslim in Iran told Adnkronos International (AKI) that the conversions were "interesting, enthusiastic but very dangerous".
"The high number of conversions is the reason that the government has decided to make the repression of Christians official with this new law," said the priest on condition of anonymity.
"Often we get to know about a new community that has been formed, after a lot of time, given that the people gather in homes to pray and often with rituals that they invent without any real spiritual guide," he told AKI.
"We find ourselves facing what is more than a conversion to the Christian faith," he said. "It's a mass exodus from Islam."
Since the 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran, at least eight Christians have been killed for their faith.
Seven of them were found stabbed to death after they were kidnapped while only one, Seyyed Hossein Soudmand was condemned to death.
Pope Baptizes Prominent Italian Muslim at Easter Vigil Service
http://www.foxnews.com/printer_friendly_story/0,3566,340669,00.html
Italy's most prominent Muslim commentator, a journalist with iconoclastic views such as support for Israel, converted to Roman Catholicism Saturday when the pope baptized him at an Easter service.
As a choir sang, Pope Benedict XVI poured holy water over Magdi Allam's head and said a brief prayer in Latin.
"We no longer stand alongside or in opposition to one another," Benedict said in a homily reflecting on the meaning of baptism. "Thus faith is a force for peace and reconciliation in the world: distances between people are overcome, in the Lord we have become close."
Vatican television zoomed in on Allam, who sat in the front row of the basilica along with six other candidates for baptism.
An Egyptian-born, non-practicing Muslim who is married to a Catholic, Allam often writes on Muslim and Arab affairs and has infuriated some Muslims with his criticism of extremism and support for the Jewish state.
The deputy editor of the Corriere della Sera newspaper, Allam, 55, told the Il Giornale newspaper in a December interview that his criticism of Palestinian suicide bombing generated threats on his life in 2003, prompting the Italian government to provide him with a sizable security detail.
The nighttime service at St. Peter's Basilica marked the period between Good Friday, which commemorates Jesus' crucifixion, and Easter Sunday, which marks his resurrection.
Benedict opened by blessing a white candle, which he then carried down the main aisle of the darkened basilica. Slowly, the pews began to light up as his flame was shared with candles carried by the faithful, until the whole basilica twinkled and the main lights came on.
The Union of Islamic Communities in Italy — which Allam has frequently criticized as having links to Hamas — said the baptism was his own decision.
"He is an adult, free to make his personal choice," the Apcom news agency quoted the group's spokesman, Issedin El Zir, as saying.
The pope administers baptism "without making any 'difference of people,' that is, considering all equally important before the love of God and welcoming all in the community of the Church," said the Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi.
Allam, who has a young son with his Catholic wife and two adult children from a previous relationship, indicated in the Il Giornale interview that he would have no problem converting to Christianity. He said he had even received Communion once — when he was 13 or 14 — "even though I knew it was an act of blasphemy, not having been baptized."
He said he did make the pilgrimage to Mecca, as is required of all Muslims, with his deeply religious mother in 1991, although he was not otherwise observant.
"I was never practicing," he was quoted as saying. "I never prayed five times a day, facing Mecca. I never fasted during Ramadan."
Allam also explained his decision to entitle a recent book "Viva Israel" or "Long Live Israel," saying he wrote it after he received death threats from Hamas.
"Having been condemned to death, I have reflected a long time on the value of life. And I discovered that behind the origin of the ideology of hatred, violence and death is the discrimination against Israel. Everyone has the right to exist except for the Jewish state and its inhabitants," he said. "Today, Israel is the paradigm of the right to life."
In 2006, Allam was a co-winner, with three other journalists, of the $1 million Dan David prize, named for an Israeli entrepreneur. Allam was cited for "his ceaseless work in fostering understanding and tolerance between cultures."
There is no overarching Muslim law on conversion. But under a widespread interpretation of Islamic legal doctrine, converting from Islam is apostasy and punishable by death — though killings are rare.
Egypt's highest Islamic cleric, the Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa, wrote last year against the killing of apostates, saying there is no worldly retribution for Muslims who abandon their religion and that punishment would come in the afterlife.
On Wednesday, a new audio message from Osama bin Laden accused the pope of playing a "large and lengthy role" in a "new Crusade" against Islam that included the publication of drawings of the Prophet Muhammad that many Muslims found insulting.
Lombardi said Thursday that bin Laden's accusation was baseless. He said Benedict repeatedly criticized the Muhammad cartoons, first published in some European newspapers in 2006 and republished by Danish papers in February.
McCain Meets Sarkozy, Comments on China
http://www.newsmax.com/politics/mccain_france/2008/03/21/82177.html
PARIS -- Republican presidential hopeful Sen. John McCain said Friday that China is harming its world image with its crackdown in Tibet and expressed hope Beijing would seek a peaceful solution to the crisis.
McCain did not discuss the issue during a 45-minute meeting with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, but told reporters later the subject was "one of the first things I would talk about if I were president of the United States today."
China's crackdown "is not correct," McCain said in the courtyard of the French presidential Elysee Palace.
"The people there are being subjected to mistreatment that is not acceptable with the conduct of a world power, which China is," McCain said in response to a question by a Chinese television journalist.
"There must be respect for human rights, and I would hope that the Chinese are actively seeking a peaceful resolution to this situation that exists which harms not only the human rights of the people there but also the image of China in the world."
The White House has urged Beijing to respect Tibetan culture and multi-ethnicity in its society.
McCain was in Paris for a matter of hours at the end of a weeklong tour of the Middle East and Europe. He was traveling as part of a U.S. congressional delegation _ including Sens. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. _ that visited Iraq, Jordan, Israel and London.
The delegation discussed a range of issues with Sarkozy, from climate warming and nuclear energy to the Middle East crisis, Iraq and Afghanistan, where France has troops.
McCain praised the state of U.S. relations with France, crediting Sarkozy, who was elected in May, with the high level of ties after years of tension that followed Paris' lead role in opposing the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq five years ago.
"I think our relations with France will improve no matter who is the president of the United States," he said.
The Arizona senator and apparent GOP presidential nominee has faced criticism from Democrats for not covering more of the cost of his overseas trip.
The McCain campaign said Thursday it would reimburse the federal government about $3,000 for political travel expenses incurred during his current trip to the Middle East and Europe.
Before traveling to Paris, McCain on Thursday was in Britain, where he attended a $1,000-per-person fundraising lunch at London's Spencer House. McCain has been traveling with Sens. Joe Lieberman, a Connecticut independent, and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., both supporters of his candidacy. The group had already been to Iraq, Jordan and Israel. The campaign has defended the mostly taxpayer financed trip as crucial for members of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Under terms reviewed by the Federal Election Commission and the Senate ethics committee, McCain will reimburse the federal government $3,000 for a one-night stay at a London hotel and first-class airfare from Washington to London because of the political nature of the event there. McCain had already agreed to pay more than $2,000 for the flight home.
Good Friday Pope Talks of China, Persecution
http://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/vatican_good_friday/2008/03/21/82223.html
ROME -- Pope Benedict XVI recalled the martyrdom of early Christians thrown to hungry lions in the Colosseum as he presided over the traditional Good Friday Way of the Cross procession at the ancient arena under a driving rain.
The 80-year-old pope wore a long white coat as he stood under a shelter overlooking the procession, which began with Italian Cardinal Camillo Ruini, the pontiff's vicar for Rome, taking the first turn at carrying a slender, plain lightweight cross.
"We find ourselves united on this day, at this hour, and in this place, which reminds us about your so many servants who, centuries ago, amid the roars of hungry lions and the shouts of the amused crowd, let themselves be ripped apart and fatally attacked for loyalty to your name," Benedict prayed to God.
He was referring to systematic martyrdom of many Christians during the first years of church under the Roman empire.
There was no noticeable increase of security before the pope's arrival at the Colosseum. Earlier in the week, Osama bin Laden accused the pope of playing a role in a worldwide campaign against Islam, an accusation the Vatican described as baseless.
Romans, tourists and pilgrims, bundled up against gusty winds and driving rain, huddled together under umbrellas to read prayer books and keep the flickering flames of candles dry.
Benedict planned to carry a lightweight cross in the last part of the procession, after a young Chinese woman walked part of the way first, according to the Vatican's program of the event.
Others chosen to hold the cross during the procession included a nun from Burkina Faso, a Roman family and a person in a wheelchair.
The pontiff, who has been dedicating much of his papacy to the problems of Catholics in China, asked Hong Kong Cardinal Joseph Zen to compose the meditations which will be read aloud during the procession commemorating Jesus' suffering before being crucified.
Zen has said the Vatican made sure there was nothing "dangerous" in the meditations that might offend Beijing. Benedict is eager for the Vatican and China's Communist government to establish diplomatic ties.
In one of the meditations, Zen laments the persecution of Catholics in many parts of the world, but he does not mention China by name.
China forced its Roman Catholics to cut ties with the Vatican in 1951, shortly after the Communist Party took power. Worship is allowed only in officially state-sanctioned churches, which recognize the pope as a spiritual leader but appoint their own bishops in defiance of the Vatican.
Millions of Chinese belong to unofficial congregations, and they risk harassment by Chinese authorities. Some clergy have been jailed in China.
Earlier in the day, the pontiff presided over a long solemn Good Friday service in St. Peter's Basilica.
Chinese Media: 'Crush' Tibet Protests
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/343653.aspx
BEIJING -- The flagship newspaper of China's ruling Communist Party called Saturday for efforts to "resolutely crush" anti-government demonstrations by Tibetans, while Beijing urged people to turn in those on a "Most Wanted" list of 21 protesters.
McCain, Pelosi Denounce Crackdown
As Chinese troops smothered Tibetan-heavy areas to avert additional unrest, U.S. presidential hopeful John McCain, a Republican, and House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat, joined a growing international chorus of criticism against the crackdown.
The protests, which started in Lhasa on the March 10 anniversary of a failed uprising against Chinese rule, turned violent four days later and touched off demonstrations among Tibetans in three other provinces.
The movement has become the largest challenge to China's control of Tibet since the 1959 uprising. It also has threatened Beijing's attempts to project an image of unity and prosperity ahead of the Aug. 8-24 Olympics.
Beijing's official death toll from last week's rioting in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa rose to 22, with the Xinhua News Agency reporting that five more civilians and a police officer died. The Tibetan government-in-exile has said 99 Tibetans have been killed - 80 in Lhasa and 19 in Gansu province.
Beijing has portrayed the protests as having been instigated by supporters of the exiled Tibetan leader, the Dalai Lama.
"We must see through the secessionist forces' evil intentions, uphold the banner of maintaining social stability. and resolutely crush the 'Tibet independence' forces' conspiracy," the People's Daily said in an editorial.
In Lhasa, shops reopened but the police presence was heavy, said residents reached by phone. The Potala Palace, the traditional seat of Tibetan rulers, and the Jokang Temple, a popular site for tourists and Buddhist pilgrims, were still closed.
"There are People's Armed Police patrolling the streets around the clock," said an employee of the Shambala Hotel, who refused to give her name due to fear of reprisal.
During a visit to Paris on Friday, McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, said China's crackdown "is not correct" and expressed hope Beijing would seek a peaceful resolution.
"The people there are being subjected to mistreatment that is not acceptable with the conduct of a world power, which China is," McCain said in response to a question by a Chinese reporter.
"There must be respect for human rights, and I would hope that the Chinese are actively seeking a peaceful resolution to this situation that exists which harms not only the human rights of the people there but also the image of China in the world," he said.
The White House said Thursday the crackdown is not cause for President Bush to cancel his attendance at the Olympics. But it requested access to the region to see how Chinese police were dealing with detained protesters.
Pelosi: Crackdown a 'Challenge to World's Conscience'
On Friday, Pelosi lent her support to the Tibetan cause on a visit to the Dalai Lama at his headquarters in India, calling China's crackdown "a challenge to the conscience of the world."
Pelosi, long a fierce critic of China, called for an international investigation and dismissed Beijing's claim that the Dalai Lama was behind the fighting as making "no sense." The Dalai Lama, who received the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize, says he does not seek independence but wants genuine autonomy to protect Tibet's unique Buddhist culture.
Fighting back against the rising criticism, Beijing has begun releasing tallies of statements of support from foreign governments and trying to get its version of events before the international community.
"It is a clear proof that the international community is on the side of China", foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang said, according to Xinhua, which reported that 100 governments have endorsed China's handling of the protests.
Without mentioning Pelosi by name, Qin said China opposes "any encouragement and support for the secessionist schemes of the Dalai clique."
On Friday, authorities intensified a manhunt for people accused of violence, posting their photos - taken from video cameras and security footage - on major Internet portals.
The 21 people are accused of endangering national security, and cited for beating, smashing, looting and arson. One suspect was shown wielding a long sword and another was a mustached man who had been shown on news programs slashing another with a foot-long blade.
Xinhua said two of the 21 suspects were arrested and a third turned himself in. Authorities offered rewards for information and promised anonymity to tipsters.
Police have arrested 24 people and another 183 turned themselves in, Xinhua said.
China Deploys Troops
Outside of Lhasa, Beijing has deployed troops across a wide swath of western China where more than half of China's 5.4 million Tibetans live. Moving from town to town, police set up blockades and checkpoints to keep Tibetans in and journalists out.
The mobilization was helping authorities reassert control after demonstrations flared in Sichuan, Qinghai and Gansu provinces, inspired by monks in Lhasa last week.
State television, in its first footage of the confrontation between protesters and police last Sunday in the Tibetan town of Aba, showed dozens of crimson-robed monks charging at a line of police standing behind plastic riot shields. Crowds of ordinary people hurled rocks and one threw a molotov cocktail as cars burned in the town ringed by snow-peaked mountains.
Xinhua said earlier that police opened fire on the crowd, wounding four and that protesters tried to break into the police armory to steal weapons. Tibet support groups say police killed at least eight and posted photos of bloody corpses on the Internet.
Abortions linked to mental illness in new study
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article3559486.ece
Women may be at risk of mental health breakdowns if they have abortions, a medical royal college has warned. The Royal College of Psychiatrists says women should not be allowed to have an abortion until they are counselled on the possible risk to their mental health.
This overturns the consensus that has stood for decades that the risk to mental health of continuing with an unwanted pregnancy outweighs the risks of living with the possible regrets of having an abortion.
MPs will shortly vote on a proposal to reduce the upper time limit for abortions “for social reasons” from 24 weeks to 20 weeks, a move not backed by the government. A Sunday Times poll today shows 59% of women would support such a reduction, with only 28% backing the status quo. Taken together, just under half (48%) of men and women want a reduction to 20 weeks, while 35% want to retain 24 weeks.
Some MPs also want women to have a “cooling off” period in which they would be made aware of the possible consequences of the abortion, including the impact on their mental health, before they could go ahead.
More than 90% of the 200,000 terminations in Britain every year are believed to be carried out because doctors believe that continuing with the pregnancy would cause greater mental strain.
The Royal College of Psychiatrists recommends updating abortion information leaflets to include details of the risks of depression. “Consent cannot be informed without the provision of adequate and appropriate information,” it says.
Several studies, including research published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry in 2006, concluded that abortion in young women might be associated with risks of mental health problems.
The controversy intensified earlier this year when an inquest in Cornwall heard that a talented artist hanged herself because she was overcome with grief after aborting her twins. Emma Beck, 30, left a note saying: “Living is hell for me. I should never have had an abortion. I see now I would have been a good mum. I want to be with my babies; they need me, no one else does.”
The college’s revised stance was welcomed by Nadine Dorries, a Conservative MP campaigning for a statutory cooling-off period: “For doctors to process a woman’s request for an abortion without providing the support, information and help women need at this time of crisis I regard almost as a form of abuse,” she said.
Dawn Primarolo, the health minister, will this week appeal to MPs to ignore attempts to reduce the time limit on abortion when new laws on fertility treatment and embryo research come before parliament.
Dr Peter Saunders, general secretary of the Christian Medical Fellowship, said: “How can a doctor now justify an abortion on mental health grounds if psychiatrists are questioning whether there is any clear evidence that continuing with the pregnancy leads to mental health problems.”
Study: Americans Still Know Right from Wrong
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000006789.cfm
The majority of Americans — 87 percent — believe in the concept of sin, according to a new study by Ellison Research. Sin was defined as “something that is almost always considered wrong, particularly from a religious or moral perspective.”
The study, conducted in August, asked more than 1,000 adults to decide whether 30 behaviors were sinful. Adultery was most often described as sinful behavior (81 percent), followed by racism (74 percent), and drug use (65 percent).
“It's encouraging to know that in this day of moral relativism, that a majority of Americans still recognize and believe that there is such a thing as sin,” said Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council.
Other behaviors considered sinful by a significant portion of Americans included abortion; homosexual activity; pornography; gossip; swearing; and sex before marriage.
Predictably, 94 percent of Americans who regularly attend church believe in sin. Yet, 80 percent of those who do not attend church also believe in sin.
Pastor John Barner, manager of pastoral care at Focus on the Family, said the study verifies that people are struggling with their behaviors.
“It is good to see that the research is confirming that humans are created with a sense of conscience, which implies that we are made in the image of God, with a sense of right and wrong,” he said.
Barner said he is disturbed that among Christians, people don't always look to the Scriptures for their standards of right and wrong.
“The message of Holy Week and the Easter season,” he said, “is that God was so concerned about the sin problem among humans that He sent His Son into the world to take the punishment for those behaviors and attitudes.
"Our belief in what He did for us at the Cross and in the Resurrection, that belief and our gratitude for His gift of eternal life, should then motivate us to live in such a way as to avoid as many of these sinful behaviors as possible.”
Americans Identify Their Most Important Relationships
http://www.barna.org/FlexPage.aspx?Page=BarnaUpdateNarrowPreview&BarnaUpdateID=294
Americans have a global reputation for being religious people, but a new study from The Barna Group indicates that people’s most important personal relationship is not with God. Family surpassed their Heavenly Father as the key personal connection. However, when asked to identify the most important group or network in their life, colleagues from their church topped the list, mentioned by three out of every ten adults.
Most Important Relationship
Adults are clearly most focused on their family in terms of important relationships. Overall, seven out of ten adults mentioned family or family members as their most significant connection. One-third said their entire nuclear family is tops, while one-quarter (22%) named their spouse and one-sixth (17%) identified their children. (An additional 3% mentioned their parents as their key relationship.)
The only other relationship mentioned by at least 3% was various iterations of people’s deity. God, Jesus Christ, Allah, and the Trinity were among the names listed by one out of every five adults (19%).
Surprisingly, just 2% of adults said a specific friend represented their most important personal relationship.
Among the related findings were:
The people most likely to list God were 40 or older.
Political conservatives were almost three times as likely as political liberals to identify God as their most important relationship (33% vs. 12%, respectively).
People in the Midwest were only half as likely as residents of the West and Northeast to say their children are their most important relationship.
The only subgroup for which at least one-third said God was their most significant relationship was evangelicals, among whom 70% listed God.
Thirty percent of Protestants listed God as their most important connection. In contrast, just 9% of Catholics did so.
Blacks were about twice as likely as all other Americans to describe their bond with God as their most important relationship.
Women were nearly twice as likely as men to list their children as their most important relationship.
Most Significant Groups
Although adults listed numerous groups or networks that they deem to be most important, those groups generally fit into five categories. Three out of every ten adults (29%) said their church was the most significant group affiliation. The people they affiliate with at their place of work represented the top choice for two out of every ten people (18%), followed by loose associations of friends that regularly gather together (14%), a hobby club or social group (12%) and interaction with people in the neighborhood (7%).
Various subgroups displayed divergent priorities.
People 25 or younger listed friends as their most critical network; church ranked fifth on their hierarchy. In contrast, adults over 25 ranked church as their key social group, followed by their work relationships.
Three-quarters of evangelicals (74%) said their church was their main social network. They were the only population segment from which half or more identified a given network.
Atheists and agnostics were most likely to rate their workplace as their top network.
Notional Christians were evenly divided, with one-fifth identifying work, one-fifth mentioning their church, and one-fifth listing friends.
Unexpectedly, residents of the West were more likely to list their church group than any other group.
While 44% of Protestants said their church was the prime social group in their life, only 16% of Catholics concurred. Among Catholics, their church ranked as the third most significant social group.
Political conservatives were more than twice as likely as political liberals to position their church as their central social group. Liberals were nearly evenly divided among work, social clubs, friends and church as their dominant social associations.
Interesting Patterns
George Barna, leader of the company that conducted the research, highlighted several intriguing outcomes.
"People were more than 50% more likely to say that their church’s congregation is their most significant group than to say that God represents their most important personal connection. That certainly reflects the interpersonal comfort that millions of people have developed at their church, but also indicates that people may have forgotten the ultimate reason for belonging to a Christian church."
The author of more than three-dozen books about faith, culture and lifestyles also noted that most Americans - even a large majority of born again Christians - struggle to think of God as a living partner in their life. "There’s an intellectual and even theological assent to the notion that God is real, He’s alive, He influences their life, and that they owe their eternal security to Him," Barna commented. "But when you get people at ease, rather than in a religious setting or in a theological context, and explore the relationships that define and direct their life, the born again public does not seem to share much intimacy with God. Perhaps one of the greatest gifts Christians could get this Easter is a deeper or renewed sense of connection with God, and a passionate determination to make more of the opportunity they have to know and be known by the living God."
APOSTACY--Oprah takes New Age Teachings Online - 500,000 sign up for 10 week course
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/mar/08030701.html
This past Monday Oprah Winfrey, considered by many to be the world's most influential woman, began a ten-week long online course on the best-selling book, "A New Earth," by New Age guru, Eckhart Tolle. "A New Earth" has already sold some 3.5 million copies worldwide, thanks largely to the publicity given to it by Oprah. According to Oprah, 500,000 people from across the world signed on to the first segment of the online course, to spend an hour and a half listening to Ekhart and Oprah talking about chapter 1 of the book, and taking calls from participants.
In recent years Oprah has been inviting an increasing number of representatives of new age spirituality onto her talk shows, including figures such as Marianne Williamson, Barbara DeAngelis, LaVar Burton, Richard Carlson, Betty Eadie, and many others. Oprah has strongly endorsed many of their works, and has included some of them in her "Book Club" list.
Since the beginning of this year Oprah has offered daily classes on her XM radio station on the book "A Course in Miracles." "A Course in Miracles" (or ACIM for short) was written by another major player in the New Age movement, Helen Schucman, who claims that the book was dictated to her by an interior voice, which she identifies with Jesus Christ. In that course, the listener is taught that there is no sin, is told not to make the "mistake" of "clinging to the old rugged cross," and that the name of "Jesus Christ as such is but a symbol."
Oprah, who is a self-labeled "Christian", was recently named the "most dangerous woman in the world" by Bill Keller, considered by some to be the world's leading Internet evangelist. He accused Oprah of peddling the equivalent of "spiritual crack." Keller has been warning the subscribers of his Daily Devotional for years about Oprah and how she uses her TV program to promote every New Age philosophy in the world, including the wildly popular book and DVD last year, "The Secret," which teaches readers or viewers that simply by desiring them strongly enough, one may obtain wealth, health and happiness.
However, rarely has Oprah shown more enthusiasm for a New Age guru than for the so-called Eckhart Tolle, who takes his first name from the well-known 13th century Catholic Rhineland mystic, Meister Eckhart. Tolle is the author of several books including "The Power of Now," and, most recently, "A New Earth."
Much like many other New Age systems, Eckhart's "spirituality" is a vague, ethereal blend of spiritual theories and ideas, gleaned from all of the world's major religions. Eckhart promises the attainment of "inner peace" and a higher state of consciousness by utilizing methods of meditation that plunge one into the "now." He also says that mankind is in a moment of crisis, in which the race must either achieve the next stage in its evolution by attaining "higher consciousness", or destroy itself and the planet.
The title of his newest book, "A New Earth," is taken from Chapter 21 from the Book of Revelations, in which the Biblical visionary says that he "saw a new heaven and a new earth." Throughout his newest book Eckhart sprinkles quotations from Scripture, and he frequently speaks about Christ and Scripture in his talks.
The core of Eckhart's teaching is a religious relativism, in which he eschews all rigid doctrine or exclusive claims to truth as dangerous and manifestations of "egoic consciousness." "The moment you say 'only my belief' or 'our belief' is true, and you deny other people's beliefs, then you've adopted an ideology," Eckhart told the participants in Monday's online class. "And then religion becomes a closed door."
Eckhart explains away conscience and feelings of guilt as but the consequence of years of conditioning. He told one caller, who confessed that she still feels guilt when she decides against going to church on Sunday, that she must recognize that "the voice" which tells her to go to church is simply the result of social conditioning.
One caller into the show told Oprah that she was a Catholic, and was having trouble seeing how Eckhart's teachings could be reconciled with her Catholicism. Oprah responded that the caller must simply realize that Christianity is but one of many ways to achieve the "higher consciousness," and that the belief that one must follow a set of doctrines is a consequence of "egoic consciousness." While Christianity is a valid way to achieve high states of spirituality, it must not be considered a unique way, or a "correct way".
"Jesus," said Oprah, "came to show us Christ-consciousness…Jesus came to show us the way of the heart…Jesus came to say, 'Look I'm going to live in the body, in the human body and I'm going to show you how it's done.' These are some principles and some laws that you can use to live by to know that way"
She concluded, "I don't believe that Jesus came to start Christianity."
"What Jesus said is much deeper than what you, how the church interprets it. There's a depth to it. And it reflects your own depth when you read it. So there's no conflict between this teaching, which is purely spiritual, and any religion."
Oprah also indicated that there are many names that one might give to that which she calls "God", including "energy," "consciousness" and "life."
Oprah also contrasted what she called the "old" spirituality vs. the "new" spirituality, as espoused by Eckhart. "The old way is the hierarchy has the authority. Church authorities tell you how to worship in church and how to behave outside of church. The new spirituality is that you are your own best authority as you work to know and love yourself, you discover how to live a more spiritual life."
Despite Oprah and Eckhart's reduction of Christianity to but one "way" amongst many other equally legitimate ways to God, and their calling Christ a "revolutionary" who has been misunderstood by the Church, and who simply came to manifest "Christ-consciousness", a quick search through the internet reveals that many Christians are following Oprah in attempting to fuse together the teachings of Eckhart, and the doctrines of the historical Christian church.
One writer on the message board on Oprah's website wrote a message with the subject line, "Scared I'm replacing my religion, which I love." "I just started the book" she wrote, "and I love the idea of the book but I guess the question I keep repeating in my head is will this be replacing my religion? How do the two work together. Can someone please help ease my mind that I'm not turning on the lord."
Many of the respondents to the questioner confessed that they too had similar misgivings about the book, but "upon reflection", realized that Tolle draws from numerous Christian sources, and that he and Oprah were giving them a "deeper understanding" of their faith.
However, Keller, and a number of other Christian pastors have begun to actively warn Christians that Oprah and Eckhart's teachings are by no means compatible with Christianity. "Oprah is now trying to be the spiritual guru to this nation," said Keller in an appearance on Fox. "Sadly, she is being used as a tool of Satan to lead millions of souls to hell with her false teachings."
Another pastor, James A. Smith Sr., writing in the Florida Baptist Witness, criticized Oprah's "spirituality" for its emphasis on the power of the individual to define truth and reality, and to totally control one's own life. "What this fails to acknowledge is that man does not define reality; man does not determine what truth is," wrote Smith. "The source of truth for our decisions and power is the one true God of all reality and He has communicated plenary propositional truths to us in the Bible and remarkably, uniquely in His incarnation in Jesus Christ.
"Oprah, as with other New Agers, is not in pursuit and in communion with God."
WorldNetDaily columnist Chuck Norris, wrote about Oprah and The New Earth, "The reason Tolle's psychology and spirituality is marketed so easy is that it is an eclectic mix of conventional and unconventional wisdom, and Western and Eastern beliefs, presented in a tolerant, non-threatening, and non-sectarian way. In other words, it's 'Religion Light,' in which one can be spiritual with 'little down and no credit.'"
Norris recommended that his readers simply sit down and read a Bible, rather than "A New Earth." "One could easily save the purchase price of 'A New Earth' and subsequently avoid misleading remarks by reading a Bible, which gives a much more thorough and accurate picture of life's purpose and methods for overcoming its obstacles," said Norris.
Charimatics warned of the Midas Touch
http://www.charismamag.com/fireinmybones/Columns/show.php
Charismatic Bible teacher Kenneth Hagin Sr. is considered the father of the so-called prosperity gospel.
The folksy, self-trained “Dad Hagin” started a grass-roots movement in Oklahoma that produced a Bible college and a crop of famous preachers including Kenneth Copeland, Jerry Savelle, Charles Capps, Jesse DuPlantis, Creflo Dollar and dozens of others—all of whom teach that Christians who give generously should expect financial rewards on this side of heaven.
Hagin taught that God was not glorified by poverty and that preachers do not have to be poor.
But before he died in 2003 and left his Rhema Bible Training Center in the hands of his son, Kenneth Hagin Jr., he summoned many of his colleagues to Tulsa to rebuke them for distorting his message.
He was not happy that some of his followers were manipulating the Bible to support what he viewed as greed and selfish indulgence.
Those who were close to Hagin Sr. say he was passionate about correcting these abuses before he died.
In fact, he wrote a brutally honest book to address his concerns. The Midas Touch was published in 2000, a year after the infamous Tulsa meeting.
“Kenneth Hagin Sr. was not happy that some of his followers were manipulating the Bible to support what he viewed as greed and selfish indulgence.”
Many Word-Faith ministers ignored the book. But in light of the recent controversy over prosperity doctrines, it might be a good idea to dust it off and read it again.
Here are a few of the points Hagin made in The Midas Touch:
1. Financial prosperity is not a sign of God’s blessing. Hagin wrote: “If wealth alone were a sign of spirituality, then drug traffickers and crime bosses would be spiritual giants.
Material wealth can be connected to the blessings of God or it can be totally disconnected from the blessings of God.”
2. People should never give in order to get. Hagin was critical of those who “try to make the offering plate some kind of heavenly vending machine.”
He denounced those who link giving to getting, especially those who give cars to get new cars or who give suits to get new suits. He wrote: “There is no spiritual formula to sow a Ford and reap a Mercedes.”
3. It is not biblical to “name your seed” in an offering. Hagin was horrified by this practice, which was popularized in faith conferences during the 1980s.
Faith preachers sometimes tell donors that when they give in an offering they should claim a specific benefit to get a blessing in return. Hagin rejected this idea and said that focusing on what you are going to receive “corrupts the very attitude of our giving nature.”
4. The “hundredfold return” is not a biblical concept. Hagin did the math and figured out that if this bizarre notion were true, “we would have Christians walking around with not billions or trillions of dollars, but quadrillions of dollars!”
He rejected the popular teaching that a believer should claim a specific monetary payback rate.
5. Preachers who claim to have a “debt-breaking” anointing should not be trusted. Hagin was perplexed by ministers who promise “supernatural debt cancellation” to those who give in certain offerings.
He wrote in The Midas Touch: “There is not one bit of Scripture I know about that validates such a practice. I’m afraid it is simply a scheme to raise money for the preacher, and ultimately it can turn out to be dangerous and destructive for all involved.”
(Many evangelists who appear on Christian television today use this bogus claim. Usually they insist that the miraculous debt cancellation will occur only if a person “gives right now,” as if the anointing for this miracle suddenly evaporates after the prime time viewing hour. This manipulative claim is more akin to witchcraft than Christian belief.)
Hagin condemned other hairbrained gimmicks designed to trick audiences into emptying their wallets.
He was especially incensed when a preacher told his radio listeners that he would take their prayer requests to Jesus’ empty tomb in Jerusalem and pray over them there—if donors included a special love gift. “What that radio preacher really wanted was more people to send in offerings,” Hagin wrote.
Thanks to the recent resurgence in bizarre donation schemes promoted by American charismatics, the prosperity gospel is back under the nation’s microscope. It’s time to revisit Hagin’s concerns and find a biblical balance.
Hagin told his followers: “Overemphasizing or adding to what the Bible actually teaches invariably does more harm than good.” If the man who pioneered the modern concept of biblical prosperity blew the whistle on his own movement, wouldn’t it make sense for us to listen to his admonition?
European Union now has world's biggest economy
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=59256
The European Union has overtaken the U.S. as the world's No. 1 economy due to the continued dramatic fall of the dollar, according to a Reuters report.
The U.S. Gross Domestic Product, or GDP, for 2007 is officially estimated at $13,843,800 billion. The 2007 GDP for the 15 EU countries is estimated at 8,847,889 billion euros, the report said.
That means when the euro yesterday topped $1.56, the EU officially became the largest economy in the world.
In a Financial Times commentary published Monday, former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan declared the current financial crisis in the U.S. "is likely to be judged in retrospect as the most wrenching" since the end of World War II.
Greenspan further concluded the U.S. financial crisis will not end until "home prices stabilize and with them the value of equity in homes supporting troubled mortgage securities."
Dollar in crisis
WND has reported the Federal Reserve is in a dilemma.
As the Fed continues to lower rates to stimulate the sagging economy, the dollar is increasingly abandoned, hitting new lows almost every day against other major currencies.
If the Fed were to raise rates to prop up the dollar, most Wall Street experts would expect a broad sell-off of U.S. stocks across the board.
Today, before the opening of the New York Stock Exchange, the dollar was trading at a new low, $1.5787 against the euro.
Just yesterday, the dollar hit a new all-time low in foreign currency exchange markets, closing at 71.44 on the U.S. Dollar Index.
Home equity foreclosures hit bank assets
Meanwhile, the crisis in the home equity market is spreading to impact major financial institutions.
Over the weekend, the Federal Reserve and the Treasury intervened, guaranteeing J.P. Morgan Chase's bargain basement purchase for a mere $2 per share of then in free-fall Bear Stearns, the 85-year-old Wall Street investment bank that had survived the Depression and two world wars.
Today, Wall Street is pressuring the Federal Reserve's Open Market Committee to drop rates on federal funds as much as 1 percent, a nearly unprecedented one-time adjustment.
Fed Funds rates, now at 3 percent, reached a high of 5.25 percent in January 2007.
Since September, the Fed has been engaged in a series of rate cuts, trying to keep ahead of the developing financial crisis and economic slowdown that began with the downturn in the mortgage markets in the middle of last year.
The real estate bubble developed as Greenspan kept fed funds rates at a historical low of 1 percent throughout much of 2003 and 2004.
The resulting liquidity pumped funds into home equity markets, stimulating dramatic price increases that continued throughout much of 2006.
That resulted in abundant cash for mortgage lenders to fund the risky sub-prime market where typically unqualified home buyers were being offered unconventional loans with artificially low mortgage payments in the initial few months.
The nation is now experiencing the fallout of collateralized mortgage obligations in which mortgages packaged as securities and sold to banks as assets were allowed to count in the banks' legal reserve calculations.
A wave of home foreclosures across the nation has caused a resulting failure in the collateralized mortgage securities held by banks.
When the collateralized mortgage obligations are marked to market, many banks across the country are finding they do not have adequate non-borrowed reserves to continue operations under current reserve requirements.
Again, the Federal Reserve has stepped in, providing multiple facilities in which struggling banks can borrow on a short-term basis the reserves needed to continue operating.
In a series of unprecedented moves over the weekend, the Federal Reserve has now made many of these same borrowing facilities available to securities and investment brokerage firms as well as commercial banks.
As WND reported, for the first time since the Federal Reserve has published the data, bank non-borrowed reserves have begun to turn negative, reflecting the increased borrowing banks are utilizing to continue operating.
Dollar losing clout around the world
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23616851/
Antique store owners in lower Manhattan, ticket vendors at India's Taj Mahal and Brazilian business executives heading to China all have one thing in common these days: They don't want U.S. dollars.
Hit by a free fall with no end in sight, the once-mighty U.S. dollar is no longer just crashing on currency markets and making life more expensive for American tourists and business people abroad: Its clout is evaporating worldwide as foreign businesses and individuals turn to other currencies.
Experts say the bleak U.S. economic forecast means it will take years for the greenback to recover its value and prestige.
Negative dollar sentiment is growing in nations where the dollar was historically accepted as equal or better than local currency — and dollar aversion is even extending to some quarters in the United States.
At the Taj Mahal, dollars were always legal tender, alongside rupees, for entry into the palace. But because of the falling value of the dollar, the government implemented a rupees-only policy a month ago. Indian merchants catering to tourists have also turned bearish on the dollar.
"Gone are the days when we used to run after dollars, holding onto them for rainy days," said Vijay Narain, a tour operator in the city of Agra where the Taj Mahal is located. "Now we prefer the euro. It gives us more riches."
In Bolivia, billboards feature George Washington's image on a $1 bill alongside a bright pink 500 euro note, encouraging savers to turn to the euro to tuck away money earned abroad or sent home in remittances.
"If the dollar falls ... save in euros!!!" say the signs popping up around La Paz for Bolivia's Banco Bisa.
And in neighboring Brazil, the Confidence Cambio money-changing service was the first to start offering yuan so travelers to China no longer have to change the money into dollars first. The service is already a hit because Brazil does big business with China, and lots of Brazilians are heading to the Olympics this summer.
"Now we tell people not to take dollars when they go abroad, it's better to change it directly to the local currency," said Fabio Agostinho, one of the firm's managing partners. "If people leave here with dollars and go abroad, they lose when they exchange them. It's the same thing whether they're heading to China, Europe or even Argentina."
In Manhattan's Bowery district, Billy LeRoy, the owner of Billy's Antiques & Props, prefers payment in euros so he can stockpile the currency for his annual antique buying trip to Paris.
"Whip out dollars at the French flea market now, and they'll shoo you away," he said at his store near apartment buildings where Europeans are snapping up units because they've become dirt cheap.
The dollar has steadily eroded in value against the euro and other currencies since 2002 as U.S. budget and trade deficits ballooned, but fears of an American recession and credit crisis have sent the dollar to stunning lows amid predictions the slump will continue for a long time.
The dollar fell to a 12-year low against the Japanese yen Thursday, dropping below 100 yen to the dollar for the first time since November 1995. The euro rose to all time high and is currently trading above $1.55.
While dollar cycles have come and gone, experts caution that it's now much more difficult to predict when this one will end because the euro didn't exist as competition for the dollar before.
During previous U.S. economic downturns, big foreign funds typically snapped up U.S. Treasury securities, helping to shore up the dollar to a certain degree. But the euro and currencies from other nations are now seen as legitimate options, and interest rates are higher outside the United States — meaning the funds can get better returns on investments elsewhere.
"You have the U.S. still holding this trade deficit, but now you have the possibility of a U.S.-led recession, and you have a weakening currency. So it's a very dark outlook for the dollar," said Gareth Sylvester, senior currency strategist with the British firm HIFX Inc., which executed $40 billion in currency trades last year.
Nations that were once seen as incredibly risky for investments — such as Brazil — are now seen as good long-term bets. And countries such as China and Russia, with burgeoning coffers of money to invest abroad, are thought to be shifting some of their reserves or diversifying fresh income to destinations and currencies outside the United States.
It used to be important for most countries "to accumulate dollars as a precautionary element against rainy days, but the accumulation of reserves has become so large in most emerging market countries that the balance is way beyond what's needed for precautionary reasons," said Eliot Kalter, a fellow at Tufts University's Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and a former International Monetary Fund official.
While most experts believe the dollar will eventually regain strength, no one is willing to predict when that will happen.
"I think the factors that are affecting the weakness of the dollar will be reversed, but no time soon," Kalter said.
The problem right now, is that "people just don't want to be holding U.S. dollars and U.S.-based equities," Sylvester added. "If you are an investor with a million dollars to invest, you look for the highest yield — you're looking at South Africa, Australia, New Zealand."
And it's not only the big-time investors that are looking for other options.
In Peru, where savings in U.S. dollars were long a popular hedge against inflation, many citizens are closing dollar accounts in favor of Peruvian soles.
At the same time, businesses like supermarkets, movie theaters and cable TV companies that used to accept dollars are now demanding soles.
Edwin Figueroa, a 29-year-old systems engineer, switched his checking account from dollars to soles seven months ago as the dollar's decline started worrying him. He doesn't think he'll be going back anytime soon.
The Peruvian sol "is stable now," he said. "And maybe in a year, the dollar will even go lower."
Air Force Prod Aids Coal-To-Fuel Plans
http://www.newsmax.com/money/Air_Force_Prod_Aids_Coal/2008/03/22/82288.html
MALMSTROM AIR FORCE BASE, Mont. -- On a wind-swept air base near the Missouri River, the Air Force has launched an ambitious plan to wean itself from foreign oil by turning to a new and unlikely source: coal.
The Air Force wants to build at its Malmstrom base in central Montana the first piece of what it hopes will be a nationwide network of facilities that would convert domestic coal into cleaner-burning synthetic fuel.
Air Force officials said the plants could help neutralize a national security threat by tapping into the country's abundant coal reserves. And by offering itself as a partner in the Malmstrom plant, the Air Force hopes to prod Wall Street investors - nervous over coal's role in climate change - to sink money into similar plants nationwide.
"We're going to be burning fossil fuels for a long time, and there's three times as much coal in the ground as there are oil reserves," said Air Force Assistant Secretary William Anderson. "Guess what? We're going to burn coal."
Tempering that vision, analysts say, is the astronomical cost of coal-to-liquids plants. Their high price tag, up to $5 billion apiece, would be hard to justify if oil prices were to drop. In addition, coal has drawn wide opposition on Capitol Hill, where some leading lawmakers reject claims it can be transformed into a clean fuel. Without emissions controls, experts say coal-to-liquids plants could churn out double the greenhouse gases as oil.
"We don't want new sources of energy that are going to make the greenhouse gas problem even worse," House Oversight Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., said in a recent interview.
The Air Force would not finance, construct or operate the coal plant. Instead, it has offered private developers a 700-acre site on the base and a promise that it would be a ready customer as the government's largest fuel consumer.
Bids on the project are due in May. Construction is expected to take four years once the Air Force selects a developer.
Anderson said the Air Force plans to fuel half its North American fleet with a synthetic-fuel blend by 2016. To do so, it would need 400 million gallons of coal-based fuel annually.
With the Air Force paving the way, Anderson said the private sector would follow - from commercial air fleets to long-haul trucking companies.
"Because of our size, we can move the market along," he said. "Whether it's (coal-based) diesel that goes into Wal-Mart trucks or jet fuel that goes into our fighters, all that will reduce our dependence on foreign oil, which is the endgame."
Coal producers have been unsuccessful in prior efforts to cultivate such a market. Climate change worries prompted Congress last year to turn back an attempt to mandate the use of coal-based synthetic fuels.
The Air Force's involvement comes at a critical time for the industry. Coal's biggest customers, electric utilities, have scrapped at least four dozen proposed coal-fired power plants over rising costs and the uncertainties of climate change.
That would change quickly if coal-to-liquids plants gained political and economic traction under the Air Force's plan.
"This is a change agent for the entire industry," said John Baardson, CEO of Baard Energy in Vancouver, Wash., which is awaiting permits on a proposed $5 billion coal-based synthetic fuels plant in Ohio. "There would be a number of plants that would be needed just to support (the Air Force's) needs alone."
Only about 15 percent of the 25,000 barrels of synthetic fuel that would be produced daily at the Malmstrom plant would be suitable for jet fuel. The remainder would be lower-grade diesel for vehicles, trains or trucks and naphtha, a material used in the chemical industry.
That means the Air Force would need at least seven plants of the same size to meet its 2016 goal, said Col. Bobbie "Griff" Griffin, senior assistant to Anderson.
Coal producers have their sights set even higher.
A 2006 report from the National Coal Council said a fully mature coal-to-liquids industry serving the commercial sector could produce 2.6 million barrels of fuel a day by 2025. Such an industry would more than double the nation's coal production, according to the industry-backed Coal-to-Liquids Coalition.
On Wall Street, however, skepticism lingers.
"Is it a viable technology? Certainly it is. The challenge seems to be getting the first couple (of plants) done," said industry analyst Gordon Howald with Calyon Securities. "For a company to commit to this and then five years later oil is back at $60 - this becomes the worst idea that ever happened."
Only two coal-to-liquids plants are now operating worldwide, all in South Africa. A third is scheduled to come online in China this year, said Corey Henry with the Coal-to-Liquids Coalition.
The Air Force is adamant it can advance the technology used in those plants to turn dirty coal into a "green fuel," by capturing the carbon dioxide and other, more toxic emissions produced during manufacturing.
However, that would not address emissions from burning the fuel, said Robert Williams, a senior research scientist at Princeton University. To do more than simply break even, the industry must reduce the amount of coal used in the synthetic-fuel blend and supplement it with a fuel derived from plants, Williams said.
Air force officials said they were investigating that possibility.
In a recent letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Rep. Waxman wrote that a promise to control greenhouse gas emissions from synthetic fuels was not enough. Waxman and the committee's ranking Republican, Virginia's Tom Davis, cited a provision in the energy bill approved by Congress last year that bars federal agencies from entering contracts for synthetic fuels unless they emit the same or fewer greenhouse gases as petroleum.
Anderson said the Air Force will meet the law's requirements.
"They'd like to have (coal-to-liquids) because of security concerns - a reliable source of power. They're not thinking beyond that one issue," Waxman said. "(Climate change) is also a national security concern."
Too good to be true? - Company finds natural solution that turns plants into gasoline
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=59402
After three years of clandestine development, a Georgia company is now going public with a simple, natural way to convert anything that grows out of the Earth into oil.
J.C. Bell, an agricultural researcher and CEO of Bell Bio-Energy, Inc., says he's isolated and modified specific bacteria that will, on a very large scale, naturally change plant material – including the leftovers from food – into hydrocarbons to fuel cars and trucks.
"What we're doing is taking the trash like corn stalks, corn husks, corn cobs – even grass from the yard that goes to the dump – that's what we can turn into oil," Bell told WND.
"I'm not going to make asphalt, we're only going to make the things we need. We're going to make gasoline for driving, diesel for our big trucks."
Wood pulp is among the many natural materials that can be converted into oil and gasoline, according to Bell Bio-Energy, Inc., of Tifton, Ga.
The agricultural researcher made the discovery after standing downwind from his cows at his food-production company, Bell Plantation, in Tifton, Ga.
"Cows are like people that eat lots of beans. They're really, really good at making natural gas," he said. "It dawned on me that that natural gas was methane."
Bell says he wondered what digestive process inside a cow enabled it to change food into the hydrocarbon molecules of methane, so he began looking into replicating and speeding up the process.
"Through genetic manipulation, we've changed the naturally occurring bacteria, so they eat and consume biomass a little more efficiently," he said. "It works. There's not even any debate that it works. It really is an all-natural, simple process that cows use on a daily basis."
But does he think it will make environmentalists happy?
"They love this. We had one totally recognizable environmentalist from Hollywood say this is everything they ever had hoped for," Bell said. "This could be considered the ultimate recycling of carbon.
We are using the energy of the sun through the plant. We're not introducing any new carbon to the environment."
The research has received strong support from the U.S. Department of Defense, Department of Energy, Department of Agriculture and committees in both chambers of Congress, and Bell plans further discussions in Washington, D.C., next week.
He expects to have the first pilot plant for the process running within two to three months, and will operate it for a year to collect engineering data to design full-scale production facilities. He thinks the larger facilities will be producing oil "inside the next two years."
And just how much oil is in Bell's bio-forecast?
"With minor changes in the agricultural and forestry products, we could create two to two and a half tons of biomass a year, and you're looking at 5 billion barrels of oil per year. That would be about two-thirds of what we use now."
Turning some of nature's produce into energy has been done for years, especially when it comes to the conversion of corn and cellulose-based products into ethanol, used to extend gasoline volume and boost octane.
The Energy Information Administration says in 2005, total U.S. ethanol production was 3.9 billion gallons, or 2.9 percent of the total gasoline pool.
Bell admits his bacterial breakthrough has been kept under wraps until now, but he plans to explain it all once his website is fully operational.
Bell Bio-Energy, Inc., aims to use modified bacteria like this to convert biomass into oil and gasoline within two years.
"We're actually gonna tell people how we do it, with streaming video. We're to the point now with our patent that we can say more and we fully intend to.
"We want to develop public support so they can understand what we're doing; to develop political support, because this is a combination of making the United States more independent from foreign oil sources; make the country healthier from an economic point of view; and it goes a long way to solving the environmental problems a lot of people are concerned about."
When asked why he thought no one else has patented this process, Bell answered, "It literally is because it's too simple. Everyone was looking for a real complicated mechanism. We looked at how it occurs naturally. But it's now going to develop in a hurry."
Recalling other great inventions, Bell cited on another person with his last name.
"Alexander Graham Bell put together stuff that was already on the shelf and made a phone. I don't want to compare myself to the great inventors. I'm not there yet, but to be able to look at simple things and create things from them, that's how we think in this company."
Australia's food bowl lies empty - what it means for the rest of the world
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7289194.stm
Though located in a remote corner of the planet, the fields of Australia's food bowl are central to the worldwide price of wheat.
In this part of rural New South Wales, water-starved farms and cavernous empty grain silos have the potential to create a ripple effect which spreads around the globe.
And that is precisely what is happening right now.
Low yield
After America, Australia is normally the second largest exporter of grain, and in a good year it would hope to harvest about 25 million tonnes.
But the country remains in the grip of the worst drought in a century, which is why the 2006 crop yielded only 9.8m tonnes.
Global wheat stocks are at their lowest levels since 1979, and the ongoing Australian drought is one of the reasons why.
To get a sense of the scale of the problem, I visited the Tottenham, a small agriculture community in rural New South Wales about a five-hour drive from Sydney, which is home to a massive grain storage complex.
Its most impressive silo looks like a space-age dome and has an interior the size of a medieval cathedral.
Now it feels like a giant echo chamber.
Almost empty
Normally at this time of the year it would be half-full of grain, much of it waiting for export.
But now it is virtually empty.
A hand holds a few grains of wheat
Many farmers have experienced their second failed crop in a row
The grain scattered on its floor would not even fill a single bag.
There is a bunker outside which is the size of two football fields, which boasts an even larger capacity.
Again, it is only a tenth full.
It provides a vivid snapshot of the problem confronting Australian farmers and their customers around the world.
At the very moment when the emerging giants, India and China, are looking to this part of the world to satisfy their food needs, the Australian food bowl is unable to deliver.
Losing money
George Grieg has been farming the land near Tottenham for nearly 50 years, and has rarely known it so bad.
Last year's crop amounted to a third of his normal harvest.
The year before was even worse - a sixth.
For the past two years he has not even managed to recoup the costs of planting and nurturing his acreage.
The sums simply do not add up, and many farmers are being forced into greater debt at a time when interest rates in Australia are at a 12-year high.
At least a wet southern summer has given them hope of a better crop this time round.
Selling the farm
And given that global wheat prices are so high, it is tempting for farmers to borrow more in their hope that their gamble pays off with a bumper harvest.
"It really is back to the bank manager," says George, explaining how that conversation will now go: "'OK, this is THE crop. Everyone is talking it up. Let's have a go at it.'
"But it's borrowed money that's doing it. And if it doesn't come off and there are too many more poor years, then you have to sell the farm."
But who is going to buy the farms?
"There are already two or three farms in the district which are up for sale and should have been sold. But people just don't have the money to buy them," explains George.
With global wheat prices at record highs, one bumper crop would alleviate much of the financial burden and help many local farmers pay off their debts.
But their hopes have been dashed before.
Last year saw one of the best starts to a growing season for years, but dry weather in recent weeks has forced the Australian government to slash its crop forecasts by 30%.
Tracking technology in the corridors of learning
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/mar/13/research.privacy
Walk around the University of Washington's (UW) computer science building and eventually you will cross paths with a researcher whose every movement is tracked by computer. Two hundred RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) antennas have been fitted into the ceilings, and individuals taking part in the trial wear RFID tags round their necks and on their possessions.
Their location is followed in real time, but unlike many Orwellian deployments of such technology - where hidden overseers know what we're all doing, but individuals don't - each participant in the RFID Ecosystem can also access the data.
"Our goal is to ask what benefits can we get out of this technology and how can we protect people's privacy at the same time," says Magda Balazinska, the project leader and assistant professor of computer science and engineering at UW.
"We want to get a handle on the privacy issues that will crop up if these systems become a reality."
Balazinska and a dozen other members of the team have been wearing RFID tags for the past year. The sensor data is collected in a central database and then passed on to applications such as Google Calendar and a Twitter widget called RFIDder (pronounced "fritter") which sends alerts to friends letting them know if they're in a meeting or have sat down to lunch.
It also automatically logs every "encounter" event between participants.
In April, the project will be expanded to include 50 students, who will be queried on a daily basis on their reactions to the experiment (more details can be found at rfid.cs.washington.edu/).
"If someone opts in, they can opt out at any time. The interface also lets them choose a level of access for others to their whereabouts and activities," says Gaetano Borriello, a UW professor behind the project. "We hope if it's useful, it will become part of the building."
RFID tags are now being incorporated into biometric ID cards, supermarket distribution networks, Washington State "Enhanced Driver's Licenses" and numerous public transport schemes. Yet regulations regarding the use of commercially collected RFID data are nascent. "It's a wild west atmosphere," Borriello says. "You put your stake down and mine."
The question of being tracked by things we own has come to the fore in the past few months. In February, Transport for London's (TfL) Oyster cards drew attention when it was revealed that the Metropolitan Police had made 3,000 requests for passenger journey data in 2006. TfL holds the data for eight weeks for "customer service purposes", but most Oyster card holders only become aware of this if they query being overcharged for a journey.
The RFID Ecosystem does have some obvious benefits: if you've lost your wallet, the tags will show you where it is. Another useful application is a "web of things", where PCs, posters and other objects around campus incorporate RFID tags.
If a participant wants to get a copy of the music playing on someone's computer, they can scan it with a handheld device and get a link to the content.
But these incentives are secondary to the main benefit of the system, which is enabling social networks. Balazinska has the system set so she can't see the whereabouts of her students, but they have access to her data.
"I don't know when I'm going to be in my office," she says. "But if I am in they can pop by." Some of her students have used the alerts to catch her on her way out of the building.
Student and participant Travis Kriplean says: "Sometimes I forget that I'm carrying a number of tags, and then suddenly come across them. That's when I'm reminded of the location tracking taking place, and it can be kind of a shock."
The RFID Ecosystem is based on a network of sensors fitted in hallways but not actual rooms, in accordance with Federal Communications Commission regulations. The ceiling-mounted antennae detect tags up to four metres away and use one watt of power.
The system software uses probabilistic activity recognition, associating people, objects and places to guess the most likely event happening. The software has trouble distinguishing between a formal meeting and two people who happen to be standing in the same room, so the team conducts "Experience Sampling" of participants to verify the data and explore their privacy concerns. "There have been no malicious intentions from within the group so far, but we'd like to be prepared for it," Balazinska says.
A similar trial has been taking place already this year in the UK, with researchers at Lancaster University in partnership with Carillion construction and BP testing an RFID-based system to monitor the safety of workers on construction sites. Sensor data is used to prevent drill operators from developing the painful condition of "vibration white finger" (caused by using a percussion drill for extended periods), but could also be used for employee monitoring.
The majority of current RFID deployments, whether in public or workplace settings, offer limited benefits to their users in return for the potential loss of privacy. Balazinska says: "This will change. The technology allows us to be at different points in the privacy-utility space."
Lead graduate student Evan Welbourne says: "Changes can be affected by building applications on top of existing sensor deployments, so they can be harnessed by the users of the system." In the experiment, allowing users to see who had looked at their data had an unintended effect.
"Some people were disappointed when they saw their friend hadn't checked up on them," Welbourne says.
Which biometric ID will lead the future?
http://cooltech.iafrica.com/features/320819.htm
You're an individual; you're unique; and you have the fingerprints to prove it.
Since fingerprints were first used as a means of identification in 1892, they have become the golden standard for identification. Everyone — including monozygotic twins who have identical DNA — has their own unique set of prints.
But, as countless movies and episodes of 'CSI' have shown, fingerprints can be tampered with. Easily removed or unintentionally damaged through occupational hazards, fingerprints can also be easily duplicated.
As concerns with identity theft and security increase, we are turning to more sophisticated ways of proving our 'identity'.
Fingerprinting is one of the most basic forms of biometrics, which is a method of identifying humans based on one or more intrinsic physical or behavioural traits. The method works by comparing an input sample with a template.
As it turns out, our fingerprints are not the only things that are unique — so too are our hands, faces, irises, retinas and vein structure. We also have a number of unique behavioural characteristics such as the way we type, speak (also physiological) and sign our name.
Some of these — such as the retina and vein layout — are almost impossible to change or tamper with. Biometric identification is, however, not without its concerns. All data, including biometrics, is vulnerable in storage or in a state of processing.
Because we have a limited number of biometric samples, they become more difficult to replace. If you forget a password or if your access token is stolen, you can always cancel the old one and get a replacement.
If, however, your biometric samples are compromised, you will be unable to replace them. So, while biometrics potentially increase personal security, they also pose a bigger threat in the case of identity theft.
Hand geometry
Hand geometry, which measures the shape and ratios of the hand, is based on the fact that almost every individual's hand is shaped differently and alters very little over the course of time.
Although the method can probably be quite easily duped, it is not without some distinct advantages: speed of operation, reliability, small template size (at under 10 bytes, the technology possesses one of the smallest reference templates in the biometric field), user-friendliness and ease of integration into an existing system.
Facial recognition
A facial recognition system captures an individual's face on camera; uses an algorithm to determine the exact proportions of the face; and then compares it to the 'faces' stored in the database.
Most facial identification systems only allow for a two dimensional frontal image of a face. This means that the systems are unable to distinguish between a live three-dimensional face and a high quality photograph of a face. To combat this problem, newer systems allow for front and side views, which in effect produce a three-dimensional map of the face.
A future technology, which is currently being explored, is thermal imaging. Using infrared, this system captures the unique pattern of blood vessels under the skin of the face. This will not only eliminate the security concern of unauthorised individuals showing the camera photographs, but will also make it considerably more tamper-proof.
Facial recognition systems are currently being used by the German Federal Police, the London Borough of Newham (in their CCTV system) and the Australian Customs Service. An advantage of facial recognition systems is that they can perform mass scanning, which is not possible with other biometrics such as fingerprinting, iris scanning and speech recognition.
Mass scanning is, however, a double-edged sword. While it can be used in airports and other public places to detect criminals or terrorists in the crowd; it also raises some concerns about privacy and government control.
Iris and retina scans
The iris has a fine texture that — like fingerprints — is determined randomly whilst the foetus is in the womb, thus making every person's irises unique.
An iris scan works by taking a high resolution image of the iris, converting the pattern into a mathematical representation and comparing this to a template of digital images.
Because the process is similar to taking a photo, it is fairly unobtrusive and can be performed up to a few metres away from the individual. However, as with facial recognition technology, there is still the problem of 'live tissue verification', which means that the system needs to be supervised.
The United Arab Emirates has used iris recognition at all its border controls since 2001.
Retinal scanning overcomes the problem of 'live tissue verification'. However, it is far more intrusive and is susceptible to problems of its own.
The retina, located in the back portion of the eye, is supplied with blood by a complex structure of capillaries which typically remain unchanged throughout an individual's lifetime.
As with thermal imaging, these capillaries can be mapped by casting a ray of low-energy infrared light into a person's eyes as they look into the scanner's eyepiece.
A difficulty with this approach — aside from high equipment costs and low user-friendliness — is that retinal patterns can be altered by certain diseases such as diabetes, glaucoma, cataracts and retinal degenerative disorders.
Capetonian teenager Simone Abramson recently patented a retinal scanning technique which involves taking pictures of the fundus (which consists of the retina, optic nerve and vascular system) using a Topcon Fundus camera.
Microchip implants
A microchip implant is a radio frequency identification device (RFID) chip that is encased in silicate glass and implanted in an individual's body. The implants can be used for storing personal information including medical history, allergies and contact information.
Some hospital in the US have been using implants in their patients so that hospital and emergency workers can have immediate access to a patient's medical history regardless of the location and state of the patient.
Microchips implants could also be used in cars or homes equipped with scanners to eliminate the necessity for keys or tags which are easily lost or stolen.
However, the problems with microchips should not be overlooked. Firstly, unless they are encrypted, they are very vulnerable to hackers. Secondly, the chips themselves present some health concerns in the form of allergies, infection or incorrect implantation. And finally, they are highly susceptible to strong electric fields such as an MRI.
Biometric passports
Biometric passports — a combined paper and electronic identification document that uses biometric information to authenticate travellers — are less vulnerable to fraud than paper documents. Furthermore, they allow governments to digitally track the movements of individuals, which would make terrorism more difficult.
Information is stored in a RFID chip in the passport. Biometrics currently used in these identification systems are facial, fingerprint and iris recognition. The chip stores a digital image of each biometric feature; however, the actual comparison of biometric features is performed by the electronic border control systems. Like microchip implants, these chips are susceptible to hackers if they are not encrypted.
A number of countries have already begun using biometric passports, notably in the EU, the US and Australia. Somalia is currently the only African country to have an 'e-passport'.
A major inhibitor in the growth of biometric identification systems has been the high cost and, for the most part, they have been reserved for military and government applications.
However, they have slowly begun to infiltrate our daily lives, with health clubs, universities, businesses and banks all beginning to use biometric systems.
Comcast Cameras to Start Watching You?
http://newteevee.com/2008/03/18/comcast-cameras-to-start-watching-you/
If you have some tinfoil handy, now might be a good time to fashion a hat.
At the Digital Living Room conference today, Gerard Kunkel, Comcast’s senior VP of user experience, told me the cable company is experimenting with different camera technologies built into devices so it can know who’s in your living room.
The idea being that if you turn on your cable box, it recognizes you and pulls up shows already in your profile or makes recommendations.
If parents are watching TV with their children, for example, parental controls could appear to block certain content from appearing on the screen.
Kunkel also said this type of monitoring is the “holy grail” because it could help serve up specifically tailored ads. Yikes.
Kunkel said the system wouldn’t be based on facial recognition, so there wouldn’t be a picture of you on file (we hope).
Instead, it would distinguish between different members of your household by recognizing body forms.
He stressed that the system is still in the experimental phase, that there hasn’t been consumer testing, and that any rollout “must add value” to the viewing experience beyond serving ads.
Perhaps I’ve seen Enemy of the State too many times, or perhaps I’m just naive about the depths to which Comcast currently tracks my every move.
I can’t trust Comcast with BitTorrent, so why should I trust them with my must-be-kept-secret, DVR-clogging addiction to Keeping Up with the Kardashians?
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