The biggest news story of the day concerns Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. It seems that an alert observer zoomed in on a photo of the president’s ID card — taken when he held it up at the polls during the recent elections — and from it discovered that Mad Jad has a Jewish background. How can he possibly survive the scandal?By the way — if Kevin Jennings has to resign, do you think President Obama will appoint Roman Polanski to take his place?
Thanks to C. Cantoni, Diana West, Fjordman, Insubria, JD, JP, Sean O’Brian, TB, and all the other tipsters who sent these in. Headlines and articles are below the fold.
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EU: Unemployment Increases, Spain Shows Negative Record
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, OCTOBER 1 — New growth has been seen in the unemployment rate in the EU for the month of August, with Spain in the worst condition. According to Eurostat data, the country infact holds the record at 18.9%, up from the 18.5% recorded in July and the 11.8% in August of last year. The Spanish rate is almost double that of the rest of Eurolandia, which saw an increase of up to 9.6% compared to the 9.5% in July and the 7.6% for August of 2008. In the EU at 27 on the other hand showed 9.1%, higher compared to July’s 9% in July and 7% for August of last year.
Considering the six EU countries that border the Mediterranean in Eurostat’s analysis, after Spain comes the negative data from France, which in August touched a rate of 9.1%, slightly down compared to July (9.2%), compared to 7.9% for August 2008. Then there’s Malta with 7.2%, down compared to July (7.3%), but that doesn’t move far from last August’s 6%. Slovenia reached 5.9%, identical to that of the prior month, while in August of last year it was 4.3%. Finally Cyprus recorded an unemployment rate of 5.6% in August 2009, up compared to the 5.4% in July, compared to the 3.5% of August 2008. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Germany: Bundesbank Boss Hints Sarrazin Should Quit
The head of Germany’s central bank said Bundesbank board member Thilo Sarrazin should resign after the former Berlin finance senator said the city’s Arab and Turkish populations had no productive function and had too many children.
Sarrazin’s interview last week with the Lettre International magazine has lead to calls that he should resign his appointment as a Bundesbank board member.
Bundesbank President Axel Weber joined the debate Saturday and said the institution’s reputation was at stake if Sarrazin continued to sit on the board.
“I already see that there’s been damage to the institution’s reputation,” Weber told reporters in Istanbul at a meeting of the International Monetary Fund.
As a political appointee, Sarrazin cannot be sacked by Weber.
In the interview, Sarrazin said of Berlin, “A great many Arabs and Turks in this city, whose numbers have grown because of the wrong policies, have no productive function other than as fruit and vegetable sellers.”
Sarrazin, a long-time member of the Social Democrats, said one of Berlin’s biggest problems is that “40 percent of all births take place in the lower class.”
“We must completely change family policy: away from cash benefits, above all in the lower class,” he told the magazine.
In an interview with the daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung published Friday, Sarrazin said he “regretted” his remarks, saying “not every formulation I made in the interview was successful,” but criticism against him continues to mount.
Members of the Social Democratic Party have called for Sarrazin’s expulsion and Berlin prosecutors are investigating whether he may have violated Germany’s hate speech laws.
Sarrazin, who began his Bundesbank post in May, was previously the finance senator for Berlin and is credited with stabilising the city’s finances. But he has long been a controversial figure prone to making incendiary comments.
Last year, Sarrazin told the Rheinische Post newspaper that the city’s poor should consider bundling up more in the winter because the city would not provide assistance for heating costs.
“If energy costs get as high as rents, then people will start to consider whether they can’t live with wearing a thick sweater at a room temperature of 15 or 16 degrees [Celsius],” Sarrazin was quoted by the newspaper as saying.
“Heating costs are included in payments for those who receive unemployment benefits,” he said. “At my house the temperature was always 16 degrees … I survived.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Iceland Exposed: How a Whole Nation Went Down the Toilet
A year ago this month, Iceland went bankrupt. We explain how it went from being the world’s happiest nation to one with a bleak future
The smallness of the society increased the risks of mismanagement: the humiliation of national bankruptcy, the speed with which the middle class was impoverished, the heaviness of personal debt, the almost instant flip from being the world’s happiest nation to being a place that could offer no future to its young. So Iceland became not only the first country to go broke, but also the first in this global financial crisis to chase its government out of power.
Soon, as living standards began to fall and people took to the streets, an uprising gathered force. It became known as the kitchen revolution because demonstrators used wooden spoons to bang pots and pans to drown out the proceedings of Parliament.
These protests had plenty of pathos, above all, the singing of the rather dirge-like national anthem. Mainly, though, this was an ironic revolt. Fake banknotes bearing the image of David Oddsson’s head were distributed, free of course, since he was widely seen as having betrayed the krona.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
‘Planned Recession’ Could Avoid Catastrophic Climate Change
The report says the only way to avoid going beyond the dangerous tipping point is to double the target to 70 per cent by 2020.
This would mean reducing the size of the economy through a “planned recession”.
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Retail: Italy — July Sales Down, 36,000 Shops Close Down
(ANSAmed) — ROME, SEPTEMBER 25 — Retail sales slid in Italy during July, says national statistical agency ISTAT. There was a 0.4% fall on the previous month and a drop of 2.6% year-on-year. The decrease hit small traders hardest. In the first six months of the year, says retailers’ association Unioncamere, 36 thousand shops closed down. Estimates for the end of 2009 are gloomier still: according to Confesercenti, around 70 thousand small shops could disappear by the end of the year. The drop in sales comes as the sixth in a row and is the steepest since March. The decrease affected both food (-2.1%) and non-food (-2.8%). Sales by smaller retailers suffered setbacks of 3.7%, while the large chains managed to keep their losses down to — 0.8%. The decrease in consumption, Unioncamere says, has led to the closure of 36 thousand shops, with the worst-hit regions being Campania (4,598 shops gone) and Lombardy (-4,056). Across Italy, even with new openings taken into account, more than ten thousand shops have disappeared in the current recession. But forecasts are glummer still. Marco Venturi, Chair of Confesercenti has told ANSA that estimates have been revised downwards, with 70 thousand shops expected to close by the end of the year, and even counting new openings the minus figure will be over 20 thousand, the worst figure ever”. A huge slice of these “at-risk traders” are small neighbourhood shops: around 30 thousand of them could go. Which is why Confesercenti is continuing to press for “concrete and speedy interventions by the taxation authorities on tax breaks on the thirteenth month payments and a 24-month extension on the bank debt moratorium”. Confcommercio is slightly more rosy: “Demand remains weak but consumer data are less negative than during the first months of the year and are stabilisiing. A moderate recovery should appear in the economy”. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Spain Only Among Big Economies in Recession in 2010, IMF
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, OCTOBER 1 — Spain will be the only among the 15 largest economies in the world to continue to be in recession in 2010, according to forecasts reported today by the International Monetary Fund in Turkey and quoted by the agencies. Recovery on the global level has begun, but it will be slow and Spain will begin to recover in 2011. According to the forecasts, Spanish GDP will drop 3.8% this year and 0.7% next year, which means a slight improvement (a tenth) over the forecasts made by the IMF six months ago. In any case, the recovery will be much slower than in the other large economies. On the employment front, the IMF sees and 18% rate for this year, which will rise above 20% in 2010. The pessimism of the fund depends on three factors which combine to aggravate the affects of the financial crisis: the recession will be harsher and will bring more unemployment “in economies that have experienced a boom in credit, a real estate speculation bubble or a large running deficit, like the United States and the United Kingdom; but the economy of the US will grow by 1.5% in 2010 and that of Britain 1%. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
‘TARP’ Turning Out to be Largest Taxpayer Swindle in U.S. History
CONGRESS AND THE WHITE HOUSE have been busy lately patting themselves on the back for staving off financial armageddon by handing out taxpayer money to Wall Street like it was Halloween candy. But while they’re trumpeting the fact that some financial firms have returned a tiny portion of the trillions of dollars that were given to banks, reality is setting in that Americans will never see that money again and will be paying it off for many, many years to come.
In late September, legislators quietly assessed whether they should begin phasing out some government aid programs like the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, which appropriated $700 billion— all of which had to be borrowed from bankers and foreign countries—to purchase bad investments, known as toxic assets, owned by financial firms.
So far, more than 600 potentially insolvent banks have been propped up by TARP. However, the program is set to expire at the end of this year, and doubts remain as to whether many lending institutions will be able to hold on without continued handouts from taxpayers.
Climate Alarmists Call For “Planned Recession”
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The Real Reason the Giant, Insolvent Banks Aren’t Being Broken Up
Why isn’t the government breaking up the giant, insolvent banks?
We Need Them To Help the Economy Recover?
Do we need the Too Big to Fails to help the economy recover?
No.
The following top economists and financial experts believe that the economy cannot recover unless the big, insolvent banks are broken up in an orderly fashion:
- Nobel prize-winning economist, Joseph Stiglitz
- Nobel prize-winning economist, Ed Prescott
- Dean and professor of finance and economics at Columbia Business School, and chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under President George W. Bush, R. Glenn Hubbard
- MIT economics professor and former IMF chief economist, Simon Johnson (and see this)
- President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, Thomas Hoenig (and see this)
- Deputy Treasury Secretary, Neal S. Wolin
- The President of the Independent Community Bankers of America, a Washington-based trade group with about 5,000 members, Camden R. Fine
- The Congressional panel overseeing the bailout
- The head of the FDIC, Sheila Bair
- The leading monetary economist and co-author with Milton Friedman of the leading treatise on the Great Depression, Anna Schwartz
- Economics professor and senior regulator during the S & L crisis, William K. Black
- Economics professor, Nouriel Roubini
- Economist, Marc Faber
- Professor of entrepreneurship and finance at the Chicago Booth School of Business, Luigi Zingales
- Economics professor, Thomas F. Cooley
- Former investment banker, Philip Augar
- Chairman of the Commons Treasury, John McFall
Others, like Nobel prize-winning economist Paul Krugman, think that the giant insolvent banks may need to be temporarily nationalized.
In addition, many top economists and financial experts, including Bank of Israel Governor Stanley Fischer — who was Ben Bernanke’s thesis adviser at MIT — say that — at the very least — the size of the financial giants should be limited.
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Big Police Depts Back Anti-Terror Citizen Watch
WASHINGTON — The nation’s big city police chiefs are backing an anti-terrorism community watch program to educate people about what behavior is truly suspicious and ought to be reported to police.
Police Chief William Bratton of Los Angeles, whose department developed the iWATCH program, calls it the 21st century version of Neighborhood Watch.
Using brochures, public service announcements and meetings with community groups, iWATCH is designed to deliver concrete advice on how the public can follow the oft-repeated post-9/11 recommendation: “If you see something, say something.” Program materials list nine types of suspicious behavior that should prompt people to call police and 12 kinds of places to look for it.
Among the indicators:
- If you smell chemicals or other fumes.
- If you see someone wearing clothes that are too big and too heavy for the season.
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Judge: Texas Ban on Gay Marriage Unconstitutional
A Dallas judge ruled Thursday that Texas’ ban on gay marriage is unconstitutional as she cleared the way for two gay men to divorce, the Dallas Morning News reported.
State District Judge Tena Callahan said the state’s bans on same-sex marriage violates the constitutional guarantee to equal protection under the law.
While the Texas attorney general had stepped into the case to say that because a gay marriage isn’t recognized in Texas, a Texas court can’t dissolve one through divorce, Tena denied the intervention.
[…]
Attorney General Greg Abbott released a statement saying that he will appeal the ruling. “The laws and constitution of the State of Texas define marriage as an institution involving one man and one woman. Today’s ruling purports to strike down that constitutional definition — despite the fact that it was recently adopted by 75 percent of Texas voters,” he said.
Lashard Williams, a supporter of gay marriage, said he believes the judge’s ruling is a step in the right direction.
“One day, I might decide to get married, and I’m born and raised here in Dallas, and I’d like to do it here in Texas,” he said.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Judge: Prop 8 Campaign Must Release Campaign Data
SAN FRANCISCO—The sponsors of California’s same-sex marriage ban must hand over some internal campaign records to lawyers seeking to overturn the voter-enacted initiative, a federal judge in San Francisco ruled Thursday.
Denying a request to shield the information, U.S. District Chief Judge Vaughn Walker said the Protect Marriage campaign had failed to show that providing private e-mails, memos and reports would inhibit the political activities of gay marriage opponents or subject them to unbridled harassment.
“The First Amendment qualified privilege proponents seek to invoke, unlike the attorney-client privilege, for example, is not an absolute bar against disclosure,” Walker wrote in an 18-page order. “Rather, the First Amendment qualified privilege requires a balancing of the plaintiffs’ need for the information sought against proponents’ constitutional interests in claiming the privilege.”
[…]
Andy Pugno, a lawyer for Protect Marriage, said he was surprised and disappointed by the judge’s ruling. The groups legal advisers would meet Friday to discuss their next steps, including a possible appeal, he said.
“Giving the losing side of a campaign this level of information will discourage anyone from ever attempting to use the initiative process in the future, knowing that sensitive strategies will likely all become public if they prevail,” Pugno said. “It just seems like Alice in Wonderland for me, that we would get to a place that a consequence of winning an election is that you would have to open your play book.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Missing National Motto Restored in Washington
‘In God We Trust’ conspicuously absent at launch of Capitol Visitor Center
An “oversight” at the nation’s new $600-plus million Capitol Visitor Center in Washington, D.C., which left the national motto “In God We Trust” absent from the historical displays and at one point prompted WND columnist and veteran actor Chuck Norris to ask if he could help correct the situation, has been fixed.
“Yesterday, individuals across the country who were willing to stand up on behalf of our nation’s religious heritage saw a major victory,” announced U.S. Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Va., in a website statement this week.
Last year, WND reported Forbes responded to concerns the Christian heritage of the United States had been scrubbed from the 580,000-square-foot facility. He worked with other members of Congress until the Committee on House Administration and the Senate Rules and Administration Committee agreed to include references to the nation’s religious history in the project.
The facility has acres of marble floors and walls, photographs of Earth Day, information about an AIDS rally and details about industry but did not originally have plans to include America’s Christian heritage.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Ross McKitrick: Defects in Key Climate Data Are Uncovered
Steve and I showed that the mathematics behind the Mann Hockey Stick were badly flawed, such that its shape was determined by suspect bristlecone tree ring data. Controversies quickly piled up: Two expert panels involving the U.S. National Academy of Sciences were asked to investigate, the U.S. Congress held a hearing, and the media followed the story around the world.
The expert reports upheld all of our criticisms of the Mann Hockey Stick, both of the mathematics and of its reliance on flawed bristlecone pine data. One of the panels, however, argued that while the Mann Hockey Stick itself was flawed, a series of other studies published since 1998 had similar shapes, thus providing support for the view that the late 20th century is unusually warm. The IPCC also made this argument in its 2007 report. But the second expert panel, led by statistician Edward Wegman, pointed out that the other studies are not independent. They are written by the same small circle of authors, only the names are in different orders, and they reuse the same few data climate proxy series over and over.
[…]
Then in 2008 Briffa, Schweingruber and some colleagues published a paper using the Yamal series (again) in a journal called the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, which has very strict data-sharing rules. Steve sent in his customary request for the data, and this time an editor stepped up to the plate, ordering the authors to release their data. A short while ago the data appeared on the Internet. Steve could finally begin to unpack the Yamal composite.
It turns out that many of the samples were taken from dead (partially fossilized) trees and they have no particular trend. The sharp uptrend in the late 20th century came from cores of 10 living trees alive as of 1990, and five living trees alive as of 1995. Based on scientific standards, this is too small a sample on which to produce a publication-grade proxy composite. The 18th and 19th century portion of the sample, for instance, contains at least 30 trees per year. But that portion doesn’t show a warming spike. The only segment that does is the late 20th century, where the sample size collapses. Once again a dramatic hockey stick shape turns out to depend on the least reliable portion of a dataset.
But an even more disquieting discovery soon came to light. Steve searched a paleoclimate data archive to see if there were other tree ring cores from at or near the Yamal site that could have been used to increase the sample size. He quickly found a large set of 34 up-to-date core samples, taken from living trees in Yamal by none other than Schweingruber himself! Had these been added to Briffa’s small group the 20th century would simply be flat. It would appear completely unexceptional compared to the rest of the millennium.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Tom Tancredo: Memo to GOP: No Guts, No Glory
Thank God John McCain lost the election. Citizen activists are now energized to defeat Obama’s Marxist radicalism — with no help from McCain’s anemic pragmatism.
Eight months into the Obama presidency the Republican opposition is suddenly thriving because of the patriotic reawakening provoked by Obama’s Marxist agenda. But this Republican revival will be short-lived if party leaders ignore the real message of the tea party protesters and 9/12 marchers.
We are witnessing a grass-roots rediscovery of our constitutional traditions and a principled resistance to the expansion of entitlement spending. This resurrection of principled conservatism could never have happened if John McCain had won the 2008 election and enshrined his anemic “hands across the aisle” opportunism as the Republican Party’s new orthodoxy. The last thing the country needs is another Republican administration dedicated to the “no entitlement left behind” Kool-Aid that Karl Rove and his clones sold to Bush and party leaders.
Obama’s radicalism has generated a genuine, mushrooming, rational fear for the future of our constitutional republic. The grass-roots revolt is not about which political party gets to preside over the death knell of liberty. It is about halting this slide into tyranny. The Republican Party can decide to help lead this revolt, or it can get out of the way and stop obstructing it.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
US Relinquishes Control of the Internet
- Icann ends agreement with the US government
- Move will give other countries a prominent internet role
After complaints about American dominance of the internet and growing disquiet in some parts of the world, Washington has said it will relinquish some control over the way the network is run and allow foreign governments more of a say in the future of the system.
Icann — the official body that ultimately controls the development of the internet thanks to its oversight of web addresses such as .com, .net and .org — said today that it was ending its agreement with the US government.
The deal, part of a contract negotiated with the US department of commerce, effectively pushes California-based Icann towards a new status as an international body with greater representation from companies and governments around the globe.
Icann had previously been operating under the auspices of the American government, which had control of the net thanks to its initial role in developing the underlying technologies used for connecting computers together.
But the fresh focus will give other countries a more prominent role in determining what takes place online, and even the way in which it happens — opening the door for a virtual United Nations, where many officials gather to discuss potential changes to the internet.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Which End of the Leash Do We Prefer?
Government promises to take care of us, at the cost of our autonomy.
My dog loves to give me not merely a day or a year of his service, but an entire lifetime. He has no goals or ambitions for his own life, so he doesn’t mind doing my bidding.
My dog is thrilled when I put on his leash and lead him around. He has no means of planning his own activities, so he is content to follow along at my feet wherever I take him.
My dog is happy when I fill his food bowl for him. Left to his own devices, he would gorge himself into obesity and that would run up his medical bills. So, he depends on me, with my superior wisdom, to choose what he is allowed to eat.
My dog knows I will take care of him when he’s sick. Because I pay the bills, I call all the shots; but this doesn’t bother him. He has no way to talk to his doctor directly, so he depends on me to make medical decisions for him.
My dog doesn’t mind if I’m constantly in his face making speeches. He just cocks his head adoringly and stares with unquestioning eyes. He has no need of fact-checkers to analyze my statements, for he has no way of distinguishing truth from falsehood.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Art: Artistic Condoms at Thyssen for Eros Exhibit
(by Paola Del Vecchio) (ANSAmed) — MADRID, OCTOBER 2 — In its most erotic exhibition ever, “Lagrimas de eros”, which will begin on October 20, the prestigious Museo Thyssen in Madrid will hand out condoms to visitors that will have images of some of the masterpieces in the exhibit printed on them, like Ribera’s San Sebastian, or Courbert’s The women in the waves, but also Nastassja Kinski photographed by Richard Avedon. Baroness Carmen Cervera, the Vice President of the Thyssen Foundation, presented the exhibit during a press conference: “I do not think that anyone will be scandalised,” observed the widow of Baron Hans Heinrick Von Thyssen and the heir of the collection of 240 works of art, with an estimated value of 800 million euros. “When they told me of a plan to sell condoms with works of art printed on them in the museum shop, it seemed like a good idea to promote safety among young individuals, more so than the morning after pill,” she added, referring to the controversy about the legalisation of the drug without a prescription, passed on Monday by the government. A protagonist in the gossip columns, the baroness in the past already sparked controversy by chaining herself to the century-old poplars in Madrid’s Paseo del Prado in order to stop the urban development that posed a threat to them. “If they break, at least we will have sons of Monet or Gauguin,” said the former Miss Spain who almost won the Miss Universe contest, with a vein of sarcasm, speaking about the artistic condoms. The “Tears of Eros” exhibit organised by the Museo Thyssen and the Caja Madrid Foundation, was inspired by the latest book by French writer, George Bataille, which showcases eroticism as the common thread in 120 works of art: masterpieces from the past centuries, mainly paintings and sculptures from the 19th century by Rodin and Delacroix, but also surrealist works or images and videos of great contemporary photographers, which curator Guillermo Solana, wanted to use to create dialogue with the myths of Eros and the Jewish-Christian biblical stories. The exhibition begins with the birth of Venus, a space entitled, “The origin of everything” in which a photograph by Man Ray, “Tears”, dialogues with “Venus” by Amaury-Duvel; in the second room, “Eve and the serpent”, contains other works like Henri Rousseau’s “The snake charmer” or photographs by Rachel Weisz, portrayed by James White. Baroness Von Thyssen said that she has no intention of selling the museum’s collection, 380 works transferred free of charge for 11 years in an agreement that will expire on February 12 2011. “It is my intention to rent it for another 25-30 years,” said Cervera, “maybe with an option to buy for my heirs, if they want it in the future.” (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Bomb Hoaxer Closed Airport to Prevent UK Authorities Deporting Him to Pakistan
A failed asylum seeker shut down an airport and put three others on red alert with a series of hoax calls warning of suicide bomb attacks.
Salman Mukaty, 27, was trying to stop himself being deported to Pakistan after more than nine years in the UK.
He told police that 16 passengers carrying ‘suicide bomb materials’ were about to board planes in airports across the country.
His false warnings forced Leeds-Bradford airport to close for one hour and put Heathrow, Birmingham and Manchester on red alert.
Alan Blake, prosecuting said it was ‘hard to conceive a more dramatic, more horrific threat’ than the series of calls made on March 27.
Mukaty believed he would avoid deportation as it would ‘not be safe for him to return to Pakistan once he had helped the UK authorities’, he added.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
CIA at Work in UK, Anti-Terror Chief Tells MPs
Details have emerged of a private briefing between the government’s most senior counter-terrorism official and MPs in which he warned of the dangers of radicalisation among Muslim prisoners and admitted that CIA agents were operating in the UK.
Charles Farr, the head of the Home Office’s office of security and counter-terrorism, told MPs the 8,000 Muslim inmates in England and Wales represented “a very significant group”.
“We know that once they get inside prison there is a danger that they will be radicalised … there is an additional risk that, for entirely legitimate reasons, people can get converted in prison to Islam. We are very aware of the risks,” he said.
On the issue of Islamist radicalisation in prison, he revealed his unit had to help a cash-strapped prison service find enough money to develop a counter-terrorist programme, including the creation of an intelligence infrastructure.
That unit, he said, had made some inroads in tackling extremism in prisons. “It is not yet a success story but it is a story of real progress,” he said, and added: “When they get back into the community what are we going to do about that?”
…
Farr, who rarely appears publicly, also disclosed that last year’s visa ban on the Islamist preacher Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, was not straightforward. He described Qaradawi as “one of the most articulate critics of al-Qaida in the Islamic world” despite his antisemitic and homophobic views. He said the ban was still a current issue.
…
Farr also said the Home Office’s research, communications and information unit, which advises on the nature of the terror threat, only has a staff of 35 from across government to challenge the output of 4,500 “incessant” Islamist terrorist websites around the world.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
France: Telecom Suicides, President Asked to Resign
(ANSAmed) — PARIS, SEPTEMBER 29 — Representatives from the French Communist Party (PCF) asked today for the resignation of the president of France Telecom, Didier Lombard, the day after the 24th employee suicide. The representatives of the PCF are also asking for the formation of an investigation committee. Socialists, through the declaration of a spokesman, Benoit Hamon, joined in the request for Lombard’s resignation. Bernard Accoyer, president of the national assembly (and member of UMP, right majority), affirmed that “evaluation work and the discussion of some situations” is “extremely urgent and necessary” in France Telecom. Regarding the UMP party, for the moment the secretary general Xavier Bertrand said that the resignation of Lombard is not part of the day’s agenda and that the president of France Telecom “reacted well” yesterday by travelling immediately to Haute-Savoie to the location where the 24th employee in 18 months committed suicide by throwing himself onto the A41 motorway from an overpass.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
France: EIB, 500 Mln to Extend Paris Tram
(ANSAmed) — BRUSSELS, SEPTEMBER 30 — An agreement worth 500 million euros between the city of Paris and the European Investment Bank aims to extend the tram line in the east of Paris. This partnership, explains the EIB, will allow the French capital to extend the timeframe for repayment of the investment to 25 years. The project, which will be to create a circular tram network, will complement the metro network, in an attempt to incentivise the use of public transport instead of cars, improving the quality of life for Parisians. The initiative for the new tram service is promoted by the Paris City council, the Ile de France region, the transport union and the local autonomous transport body (RATP). The line affected is the T3 line, which is part of the Regional mobility plan and the 14.5 km extension from Porte d’Ivry to Porte de la Chapelle, with 26 new stations, will improve connections with the metro and regional transport connections (RER). This is not the first time that the EIB has financed tram and metro lines in Europe’s cities: it has previously done so in Athens, Alicante, Barcelona, Bilbao, Brussels, Berlin, Valencia, Lisbon, London, Madrid, Monaco, Dusseldorf, Manchester, Dublin and Prague.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Germany: Berlin Boosts Security Amid Terror Fears
Fears of a potential terror attack are overshadowing festivities to mark the anniversary of German reunification. Security around the Brandenburg Gate is tight with increased police presence. The capital’s interior minister, meanwhile, urged Berliners to be “increasingly vigilant.”
Berlin’s police force is on high alert. Following a series of al-Qaida propaganda videos directly threatening Germany, officials have beefed up security around the festivities to mark German reunification. “Due to the altered security situation there will be significantly more security forces on site on October 3,” Berlin’s Interior Minister Ehrhart KÃrting told SPIEGEL ONLINE. “Additionally the police will be warned to watch out for suspicious people and vehicles.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
German Publisher Drops Novel Over Fears of Muslim Backlash
Dusseldorf — A German publisher has cancelled plans to publish a mass-market novel out of fears that it might face violent protests due to a rude reference to the Koran, Der Spiegel magazine reported Saturday. The crime novel — about the “honour killing” of a Muslim woman — had been scheduled for September publication, but the Droste publishing company of Dusseldorf decided not to print it after all, the magazine said in a story to appear in its Monday issue.
It said the publisher had first asked the author, Gabriele Brinkmann, writing under the pen name WW Domsky, to tone down dialogue in “To Those Worthy of Honour” which might be construed as offensive, but she had refused.
Spiegel reported that the offensive phrase in question was a character saying: “You can shove your Koran up …”
Publisher Felix Droste had asked an expert on Islamic society to study whether the crime story’s text could compromise the safety of his firm or his family, and the expert suggested the phrase be modified.
But the author refused to alter it to “You can shove your honour up …”
Droste wrote back that riots over Danish cartoons that poked fun at the Prophet Mohammed in 2005 showed that anyone publishing insults to Islam was putting their safety at risk, Spiegel said.
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Italy: Prestigiacomo Investigated for Embezzlement
Charged with purchasing fashion articles and women’s leather goods on ministerial credit card
ROME — Italy’s minister for the environment, Stefania Prestigiacomo, is under investigation by the Rome public prosecutor’s office for embezzlement relating to alleged purchases of fashion articles and women’s leather goods with an environment ministry credit card. Her inclusion on the investigated persons’ register is a mandatory act. Investigators will have to ascertain whether any purchases made were for personal reasons or ministerial purposes. This is the point that magistrates at the public prosecutor’s office have requested colleagues at the ministers’ tribunal, which has jurisdiction in the matter, to clear up.
PHONE TAPS — The investigation was prompted by electronic eavesdropping carried out by the financial police in Florence in connection with other court proceedings. In the tapped calls, two individuals, one of whom is a ministry civil servant, are reported to discuss purchases made by the minister. This led to a report being forwarded to the Rome public prosecutor’s office and the initiation of proceedings to ascertain whether the conversations taped by the financial police provide grounds for criminal prosecution.
REPLY: “NEVER USED FOR PERSONAL PURPOSES” — “I have never used the ministry credit card for personal purposes”, replied the minister, Stefania Prestigiacomo. “Statements of account and all the paperwork concerning ministry-related expenses are at the magistrates’ disposal, as they always have been. No one has ever looked at them. Investigators could have examined them and carried out their checks before they accused me of embezzlement on the basis of a tapped phone call between two individuals, one under investigation and the other a ministry employee. I am profoundly disgusted and dismayed, and I demand that this entire affair should be brought into the open. I am ready to take legal action”, the minister concluded, “against anyone who casts doubt on my honesty”.
English translation by Giles Watson
www.watson.it
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Italy Approves Tax Amnesty Bill
Italy’s parliament has approved a controversial tax amnesty on undeclared funds held overseas.
Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi says the expected repatriation of 300bn euros ($437bn, £274bn) will help boost state revenues.
But the left-wing opposition says the amnesty will benefit organised crime.
This is Italy’s third tax amnesty in only eight years and has drawn heavy criticism from opposition politicians who have branded it a reward for crime.
The new amnesty not only provides anonymity for anyone repatriating undeclared funds held illegally offshore, but also provides impunity for crimes of false accounting relating to these funds.
Italy has one of the highest rates of tax evasion in the European Union. Italian taxpayers who repatriate funds held illegally abroad will pay the government a relatively small 5% tax rate on their money.
Italy has thus celebrated the global crackdown on offshore tax dodgers decided at a recent G8 meeting by enacting this generous law which opponents say will only encourage more tax evasion in the future.
The governor of the bank of Italy, Mario Draghi, has noted that in similar amnesties in the United States and Britain, the identity of the taxpayer is not kept secret and beneficiaries are obliged to pay the full rate of tax owing plus interest.
Most of the Italian money held abroad is deposited in Switzerland and Luxembourg.
Italian President Giorgio Napolitano says he will sign the new tax amnesty into law during the weekend.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Pre-Teen Girl Reports Rape at Swedish School
Three boys aged 12-13-years-old are suspected of having raped a 10-year-old girl at a school in Linköping in central Sweden.
The alleged assault occurred on Tuesday while the children were on their lunch break in an area of woodland near the school.
The school reported the incident to the council and to the police on Wednesday after the visibly shaken girl told teachers of her ordeal.
“I don’t know if the boys have confessed. The police are investigating the matter now, but we consider this to be a very serious incident,” Thomas Brandin at Linköping council said at press conference held on Tuesday, local newspaper Corren.se reports.
Linköping police have confirmed that the boys have not yet been interviewed and that they have classified the case as rape.
The school has however talked to the boys and confirms that they have admitted the offence, according to a report in the Dagens Nyheter newspaper.
As the boys are under the age of criminal responsibility there will not be a legal consequences as a result of the alleged rape.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Sicily: Violent Flooding Rocks Messina
Death toll at 18 and rising
(Updating Previous) (ANSA) — Messina, October 2 — Rescue workers in Sicily counted at least 18 dead and ten missing on Friday in the wake of violent flooding and mudslides in and around Messina with the death toll expected to rise.
Dispatched to supervise relief efforts, civil protection chief Guido Bertolaso said “the first priority is to focus on relief efforts before we start talking about whose fault this is”.
Bertolaso said rescuers were doing “everything humanly possible” to help survivors stranded in the areas hardest hit but that the mudslides covering roads and railways made getting to them”extremely difficult”. Some four hundred people have been evacuated from their homes by boat and helicopter, according to local officials who added that at least 40 were injured, some of them seriously.
After a survey of the damage area, Bertolaso laid much of the blame on illegal building. “What do you expect to happen if you build a house on the banks of a river?” said the civil protection chief pointing to a building in ruins.
“Water runs its course and if there are houses in the way, this is what happens”.
“I’ve been talking about this situation for years, but nothing ever gets done about it,” said Bertolaso, adding that “the civil protection service can’t be held responsible for disasters that result from illegal building”.
Extending his condolences to the families of victims, President Giorgio Napolitano said Italy could choose between “a serious plan to invest in security” or “monumental works” at the risk of more disasters striking down the line.
Some observers saw this as a reference to a nearby project to build the world’s largest suspension bridge linking Sicily to the mainland.
Torrential rains between Thursday and Friday dumped over 230cm of water on the Sicilian city in less than an hour knocking down houses in city districts and nearby towns and leaving dozens of people stranded on top of their roofs in areas rendered inaccessible. The government has declared a state of emergency in the area as relief efforts continued together with the search for the wounded and missing.
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Slovenia: Mega Counter-Criminality Investigation Into Busines
(ANSAmed) — LJUBLJANA, SEPTEMBER 30 — Two of Slovenia’s major businessmen were taken into custody today under suspicion of embezzlement during the privatisation of companies of which they were directors, and over accusations of money-laundering. The police said that Bosko Srot, former director of Slovenia’s largest brewery, Pivovarna Lasko, and Igor Bavcar, former director of Slovenian national oil company Istrabenz, were taken in this morning for questioning over “suspected abuse of power and money-laundering”. According to police sources “a wide-ranging counter-criminality operation in the businesssector” is under way in Slovenia. In total eight people have been taken into custody, and dozens of homes and offices have been searched. According to the Ljubljana press, the arrests are part of an investigation into the sale two years ago of 7% of shares in Istrabenz, which were held at the time by Pivovarna Lasko, a company owned by Bavcar. The transaction is said to have been handled illegally. Bosko Srot has been accused by the press of embezzlement several times in the past, and even former prime minister Janez Jansa accused him of a series of “privatisations of major companies, conducted in a shady and unlawful manner”.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
So is David Cameron Ruthless Enough to Save Britain?
Cameron possesses the brains, fluency and star quality to become a remarkable prime minister if he can also find iron in his soul. He can cherish no hopes of national unity or social harmony, any more than Thatcher could.
What he must do will injure a host of vested interests, who will fight him from first day to last.
Thatcher’s example remains hugely important, not because today’s Tories must do the same things — Britain and its problems have changed in 30 years — but because she proved that the impossible was possible.
Apparently irreversible national decline could be halted. The challenge for David Cameron is enormous — but so is his once-in-a-generation opportunity.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Health Service Drops Out of EU’s ‘Top Twenty’
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, SEPTEMBER 28 — >From today, the ‘day-after’ pill goes on unrestricted sale across Spain without need to present either doctor’s prescription or proof of age. Meanwhile, the country has dropped out of the group of the top-20 European countries with the best healthcare services, coming in at number 21 in the league table drawn up by the analysis run by Health Consumer Powerhouse with EU backing. Putting the ‘day-after pill’ on open sale is a measure resolved on by the socialist government of José Luis Zapatero in an attempt to cut down on the number of unwanted pregnancies and abortions among the country’s adolescent population. In the words of Health Minister Trinidad Jimenez, the step has been taken to “facilitate access” to the drug “for all women, wherever they happen to live” , as it is essential that it be taken rapidly. The pill is an emergency contraceptive which has to be taken within 72 hours of having sexual relations. Until now, it has only been available in Spain on presentation of a doctor’s prescription or after a medical consultation. The measure, which was announced three months ago, has come into force following the compulsory procedures by Spain’s pharmaceutical agency, while controversy continues to mount in the country over the new law decriminalising abortion, which was approved on Saturday by the Zapatero government. A large protest march has been called for October 17 with one million protesters taking part, by all accounts. As for Spain’s slipping out of its European top-twenty spot in terms of health services, the report — cited by the Europa Press agency — has put it in among former Eastern-block countries, due to negative marks for access to and quality of services, in rights granted to patients and in its E-health information system. Commenting on the figures, sources inside the Health Ministry are stressing that the report “has a very relative value”, combining as it does “data from various studies, publications and sources, sometimes unsupported by official data or accredited sources”. But one example of the poor level of information for health-service users has come today, the day on which the open sale of the ‘day after pill’ has come into force in Spain’s chemist shops. According to the EFE agency, it is almost impossible to find the instruction leaflet which should accompany the drug anywhere in the capital or in other Spanish cities. The leaflet should lay out the drug’s side effects and inform of the existence of other forms of contraception, as well of ways to avoid sexually-transmitted diseases. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden: Man Thrown Off Bus in Gender Row
A jobsworth bus driver in northern Sweden refused to allow a man to travel with his girlfriend on transport arranged for a ladies night out.
Henrik Larsson decided to accompany his girlfriend for a spot of shopping in Piteå. But little did he know they would end up stranded in Arvisjaur, because he wasn’t the right sex.
The journey began in Arjeplog and was part of an organised evening out for a coach-load of women.
When the bus made a stop mid-way, the driver informed Larsson of the girls-only rule and told him he wasn’t allowed to travel with the group further.
“I’ve never felt so stupid,” Larsson told the Piteå- Tidningen newspaper. “I didn’t believe it was true. Nowhere did it state that it was only women that could go on the bus.”
The company that arranged the evening — Piteå Presenterer — say they regret the actions of the driver.
“This is simply badwill” says Susanne Gustavsson, spokesperson from the company. “You can’t just throw passengers off halfway.”
Larsson and his girlfriend contacted a friend who drove a 160-kilometre round trip to take them home.
The bus driver could now face action on grounds of sexual discrimination.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
Transport: Marseille Mayor Wants Clarification From Algeria
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, SEPTEMBER 22 — Marseille Deputy-Mayor, Roland Blum, has asked to meet with the Algerian government to clarify several points about the new measures adopted in Algeria in the framework of the budget supplement (LFC), which tighten measures regarding imports and are hurting the French city’s port. “Algeria’s budget law is very upsetting,” said Blum, quoted in the Algerian press, “and it can have important repercussions on maritime traffic.” The measures adopted in July in the Northern African country aim to reduce imports and to relaunch manufacturing in the country and involve the introduction of “credit documentation”, or a written commitment by the bank required to import any products. For Blum, who will be in Algiers on October 20 and 21, this is a “significant return to protectionist policies” in the country. Since the beginning of August, according to the Maritime and River Transport Union, cargo traffic between the port of Marseille and Algeria has sharply declined. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Treemometers: A New Scientific Scandal
A scientific scandal is casting a shadow over a number of recent peer-reviewed climate papers.
At least eight papers purporting to reconstruct the historical temperature record times may need to be revisited, with significant implications for contemporary climate studies, the basis of the IPCC’s assessments. A number of these involve senior climatologists at the British climate research centre CRU at the University East Anglia. In every case, peer review failed to pick up the errors.
At issue is the use of tree rings as a temperature proxy, or dendrochronology. Using statistical techniques, researchers take the ring data to create a “reconstruction” of historical temperature anomalies. But trees are a highly controversial indicator of temperature, since the rings principally record Co2, and also record humidity, rainfall, nutrient intake and other local factors.
Picking a temperature signal out of all this noise is problematic, and a dendrochronology can differ significantly from instrumented data. In dendro jargon, this disparity is called “divergence”. The process of creating a raw data set also involves a selective use of samples — a choice open to a scientist’s biases.
Yet none of this has stopped paleoclimataologists from making bold claims using tree ring data.
[…]
At the insistence of editors of the Royal Society’s Philosophical Transactions B the data has leaked into the open — and Yamal’s mystery is no more.
From this we know that the Yamal data set uses just 12 trees from a larger set to produce its dramatic recent trend. Yet many more were cored, and a larger data set (of 34) from the vicinity shows no dramatic recent warming, and warmer temperatures in the middle ages.
In all there are 252 cores in the CRU Yamal data set, of which ten were alive 1990. All 12 cores selected show strong growth since the mid-19th century. The implication is clear: the dozen were cherry-picked.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: MI5 Targeted by Islamic Extremists in Rushed Recruitment Drive After July 2005 Attacks on London
MI5 is facing questions over whether it recruited up to six al Qaeda sympathisers in the rush to find Islamic recruits in the wake of the worst terrorist attacks on mainland Britain for a generation.
The potential breach occurred as the security services battled to fill an intelligence gap in the wake of the July 7 2005 bombings on London’s transport network which resulted in the deaths of 52 people.
The Security Service was desperate to understand why and how four men from Leeds had plotted the attacks to give them a better chance of identifying future threats.
The Daily Telegraph has learned that six new Muslim recruits were thrown out of the service because of serious concerns about their pasts.
Two of the six were said to have attended training camps in Pakistan where they could have come into contact with al-Qaeda recruiters. The remainder had unexplained gaps of up to three months in their curricula vitae.
Patrick Mercer MP, the chairman of the Home Affairs sub-committee on terrorism, said the two who had allegedly been on al-Qaeda training camps were given “several weeks” training before they were ejected from the service. The remaining four were identified before they entered training.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Banca Nuova: Agreement With Bank of Morocco on Cash Flow
(ANSA) — PALERMO, SEPTEMBER 30 — An agreement has been signed today in Casablanca by president of Banca Nuova, Marino Breganze, and Benchaaboun Mohamed, president of Morocco’s Banque centrale popoulaire, over money sent home by emigrants and the flow of money tied to commercial activities. The banks committed to respecting each other’s rules on transparency and money-laundering in the protocol on the transfer of capital, which will take place through the Popolare di Vicenza, Banca Nuova’s parent company. “The signing of this agreement is an important step in our programme for cooperation with the countries of the Mediterranean and for assistance to the companies which operate there”, said Breganze. Director General Francesco Maiolini announced that an office of the province of Messina was opened in recent days close to Carthage, which specialises in building products, and which arrived in Tunisia last February as part of a business mission organised by Banca Nuova. Today’s ceremony is the first commitment towards a transfer prepared by the bank, in collaboration with Confindustria and the Sicily Region, which will continue until Saturday. Tomorrow the delegation will hold initial meetings with the Moroccan authorities and entrepreneurs selected from the BCP’s best customers. A transfer to the capital Rabat is scheduled for tomorrow, where there will be meetings at a ministerial level. The Italian embassy and the Italian Foreign Trade Commission will take part in the meetings. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Morocco: Record Wheat Harvest at 10 Mln Tonnes
(ANSAmed) — RABAT, SEPTEMBER 28 — In Morocco, the grain harvest registered a record with 10.2 million tonnes in 2008-2009, reports press agency MAP, which stressed that the positive results, the country’s best in the last 50 years, was due to abundant rainfall last spring. It was also added that in the first 6 months of 2009, wheat and corn imports fell respectively by 40% and 22%. (ANSAmed).
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Defence: Turkey’s First Attack Helicopter Makes Test Flight
(ANSAmed) — MILAN, SEPTEMBER 28 — Turkey’s first national attack helicopter, T129 ATAK successfully completed its first test flight, at Augusta Westland’s facilities near Milan, as Anatolia news agency reports. Senior Turkish and Italian officials attended the ceremony held Monday on the occasion of the test flight for combat and reconnaissance helicopter T129 ATAK — an enhanced version of the Italian Agusta Westland’s A-129s — which will be jointly produced by Turkey and Italy. Turkey’s Tusas Aerospace Industries (TAI) — the prime contractor — and Italy’s Agusta Westland — a subcontractor — will jointly produce the aircraft under an 2007 agreement signed for the purchase of 51 (plus 40 optional) helicopters for the Turkish Land Forces. AgustaWestland CEO Giuseppe Orsi pointed out that the project T-129 ATAK, was ahead of the planned schedule. Orsi said TAI had great technological capabilities noting that this project would contribute to TAI and Turkish aviation industry in general. TAI General Director, Muharrem Dortkasli said the first T129 ATAK would be handed over to the Turkish Armed Forces in July 2013 adding that their final goal was to sell T129s in the international merket. The helicopter will be equipped with avionic and weapon systems designed and produced indigenously, and the mission computer and targeting, navigation, communication and electronic warfare systems will be developed and produced by ASELSAN, a leading defense company in Turkey. TAI will have the right to use and administer the intellectual property of the T129 ATAK Helicopter, and it will be the sole source for its work share under the ATAK program for all potential future world wide sales of the T129 ATAK Helicopter. The program agreement also provides TAI with the right to sell and market the T129 ATAK Helicopter worldwide. Established on 15 May 1984, TAI, is a supplier for Aermacchi, AgustaWestland, Airbus, Boeing, EADS CASA, Eurocopter, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, MDHI, Sikorsky and co-produced so far; F-16 fighters, CN-235 light transport/maritime patrol/surveillance aircraft, SF-260 trainers, Cougar AS-532 general purpose helicopters. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Lebanon: Lazio’s Production Excellence on Display in Beirut
(ANSAmed) — ROME, SEPTEMBER 25 — ‘Exclusive in Lazio’, the video produced by High Life TV for the region, will be presented Monday in Beirut in the multifunctional hall at the Italian embassy. The presentation should be followed by a meeting on trade issues at the beginning of next year, with a focus on the nautical, fashion and jewellery production sectors in Lazio. Some 170 Lebanese operators in the three sectors have already confirmed their participation. As the Italian Trade Commission (ICE) in Beirut pointed out, the region of Lazio according to ISTAT, exported 14.5 billion euros in goods in 2008, with an increase of 7.7% over 2007, and a quota that increased from 3.8% to 4.0% on Italy’s total exports. There are over 8,600 businesses in Lazio which export their products. The Middle East represented 4.5% of Lazio’s exports with 840 million euros, a value that has more than doubled since 2005. Lazio, out of the 20 Italia regions, was the sixth largest exporter in 2008. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Revealed to Have Jewish Past
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s vitriolic attacks on the Jewish world hide an astonishing secret, evidence uncovered by The Daily Telegraph shows.
A photograph of the Iranian president holding up his identity card during elections in March 2008 clearly shows his family has Jewish roots.
A close-up of the document reveals he was previously known as Sabourjian — a Jewish name meaning cloth weaver.
The short note scrawled on the card suggests his family changed its name to Ahmadinejad when they converted to embrace Islam after his birth.
The Sabourjians traditionally hail from Aradan, Mr Ahmadinejad’s birthplace, and the name derives from “weaver of the Sabour”, the name for the Jewish Tallit shawl in Persia. The name is even on the list of reserved names for Iranian Jews compiled by Iran’s Ministry of the Interior.
Experts last night suggested Mr Ahmadinejad’s track record for hate-filled attacks on Jews could be an overcompensation to hide his past.
Ali Nourizadeh, of the Centre for Arab and Iranian Studies, said: “This aspect of Mr Ahmadinejad’s background explains a lot about him.
“Every family that converts into a different religion takes a new identity by condemning their old faith.
“By making anti-Israeli statements he is trying to shed any suspicions about his Jewish connections. He feels vulnerable in a radical Shia society.”
A London-based expert on Iranian Jewry said that “jian” ending to the name specifically showed the family had been practising Jews.
“He has changed his name for religious reasons, or at least his parents had,” said the Iranian-born Jew living in London. “Sabourjian is well known Jewish name in Iran.”
A spokesman for the Israeli embassy in London said it would not be drawn on Mr Ahmadinejad’s background. “It’s not something we’d talk about,” said Ron Gidor, a spokesman.
The Iranian leader has not denied his name was changed when his family moved to Tehran in the 1950s. But he has never revealed what it was change from or directly addressed the reason for the switch.
Relatives have previously said a mixture of religious reasons and economic pressures forced his blacksmith father Ahmad to change when Mr Ahmadinejad was aged four.
The Iranian president grew up to be a qualified engineer with a doctorate in traffic management. He served in the Revolutionary Guards militia before going on to make his name in hardline politics in the capital.
During this year’s presidential debate on television he was goaded to admit that his name had changed but he ignored the jibe.
However Mehdi Khazali, an internet blogger, who called for an investigation of Mr Ahmadinejad’s roots was arrested this summer.
Mr Ahmadinejad has regularly levelled bitter criticism at Israel, questioned its right to exist and denied the Holocaust. British diplomats walked out of a UN meeting last month after the Iranian president denounced Israel’s ‘genocide, barbarism and racism.’
Benjamin Netanyahu made an impassioned denunciation of the Iranian leader at the same UN summit. “Yesterday, the man who calls the Holocaust a lie spoke from this podium,” he said. “A mere six decades after the Holocaust, you give legitimacy to a man who denies the murder of six million Jews while promising to wipe out the State of Israel, the State of the Jews. What a disgrace. What a mockery of the charter of the United Nations.”
Mr Ahmadinejad has been consistently outspoken about the Nazi attempt to wipe out the Jewish race. “They have created a myth today that they call the massacre of Jews and they consider it a principle above God, religions and the prophets,” he declared at a conference on the holocaust staged in Tehran in 2006.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey: Imams Told to Collect Money
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, OCTOBER 2 — A municipal religious leader in Diyarbakir was warned by his superior after he sent a text message to local imams, telling them to collect money for a mosque or else face an inquiry, daily Hurriyet reports. The mufti of Sur Municipality, Hasan Yakut, in a text message said: “The 91 mosques that failed to collect money for the Religious Affairs Directorate mosque should do so today. There will be an inquiry against those who don’t. Sur mufti.” Several imams who complained to reporters said they were not comfortable asking for money from their congregations. One imam, who did not want to be named because state servants are not allowed to make public statements, said: “We are religious officials. We give the congregation religious information and help in their efforts to do religious absolutions. But they turned us into beggars”. He also said imams were asked to collect money for a new official car for the mufti. Diyanet-Sen union Diyarbakir branch chief Omer Evsen confirmed the text but claimed that imams were not forced to do so. He said the Religious Affairs Directorate, which manages all imams and muftis, had the right to collect donations with the Interior Ministry’s approval, while imams and muftis could collect donations with the consent of local administrators or governors. “That’s what mufti Hasan Yakut did, and donations are voluntary. I also gave 100 Turkish Liras,” said Evsen. He said despite the government’s previous pledges that it would eliminate “begging by imams,” nothing had changed and most of the mosques’ utility bills were paid through donations. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
TV: Turkey Welcomes New Disney XD Channel
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, OCTOBER 2 — After gaining popularity and a wide audience in Turkey and around the world, renowned brand in entertainment and movie production Disney, will launch a new channel nationwide this weekend, daily Hurriyet reports. Disney XD, aiming to attract an even broader spectrum of viewers, is going to replace the international and well-known Jetix channel, the same as it did in the United States, France and Poland earlier this year. It doesn’t mean, however, that the most popular Jetix shows will disappear. The new channel will take over some of the best-known productions, adding new elements to the newly introduced lineup. “The Disney channel is addressed to families and girls mostly. Now we would like to reach a broader audience,” Maciej Bral, Vice President and General Manager of Disney Channels for Central and Eastern Europe, South Africa and Middle East said. “We were asking boys aged 6 to 14 what they are lacking in the current television lineup and have found a niche,” Bral said. “There were single shows and movies addressed to them, but what we would like to present is a complex issue.” Bral admitted, however, that the channel didn’t aim to exclude girls. “They will be able to find characters they can identify with,” he said, “Boys in general identify less with the TV series characters, so with the new channel we are not losing any part of the audience.” (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Afghanistan: U.S. Base Makes Chinese Nervous
Government paper claims American facility targets Russian, Iran, others
China is becoming concerned by the increased presence of the United States in Afghanistan and is complaining about the U.S. lease renewal at the Manas Air Base in neighboring Kyrgyzstan, suggesting that these activities are part of an overall containment effort against China, according to a report from Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Bangladesh: Catholic University Student Attacked by Muslim Extremists in a Public Park in Dhaka
Four members of Hizbut Tawhid, an Islamist movement, beat Anup Rodrigues, 25, from Dhaka. They accused him of insulting Muhammad. Now he is afraid for his life and that of his brothers, who are also university students.
Dhaka (Asia News) — Members of an Islamist group, Hizbut Tawhid, attacked a Christian student in Dhaka, after they accused him of criticising Muhammad. Last Sunday Anup Rodrigues, a 25-year-old Catholic university student, had just left the Holy Rosary Church after evening Mass.
Anup was sitting at a bench in Farmgate Park, waiting for friends when four unidentified men, dressed in traditional Muslim garb, attacked him from behind. In the course of the assault, one of the attackers began accusing him of insulting the prophet, describing Christians as a “curse on the nation”, who want to convert Muslims.
“They started beating me with iron rods and bamboo sticks, without letting say a word,” the student said. “As they were pounding away at me, I prayed to Our Lady to save me. When they relented for a moment I was able to get away.”
“After the attack I stopped to think about what had happened and why they attacked me,” the young man told AsiaNews.
“I remembered then that a week before I was in the park with friends where we talked about prophets in the various religions. One of the men who attacked me was sitting across from us. He told us that he belonged to Hizbut Tawhid and that they had a duty to carry out jihad to punish people like us.”
Now Anup is afraid for his life, that of his friends and his two brothers who, like him, attend university. A month ago, someone killed a Baptist Christian named Swopon in the same area.
For this reason, Anup and his mother, Monica, have not filed a complaint with police. They place little trust in law enforcement since the young man’s father, Peter, and uncle, Paul, disappeared at work on 17 August 2006.
Monica Rodrigues turned to police after she received a ransom note, but the investigations have led nowhere.
Now, after the attack against Anup, she fears she might lose her sons, and remains at a loss as to who might help her.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Honduras Thaw Paves Way for Talks
A thaw in the Honduras political crisis has paved the way for talks between representatives of the ousted president and the man behind his downfall.
Aides to Manuel Zelaya and interim President Roberto Micheletti will reportedly meet next week.
The talks would precede a visit by the Organisation of American States aimed at brokering a deal, the OAS says.
An emergency decree limiting civil liberties would be lifted within days, Mr Micheletti was quoted as saying.
Hours after he met a visiting US Congressional delegation, he said a dialogue was “beginning” between his supporters and those of Mr Zelaya.
The ousted president was forced from office on 28 June by a military-backed coup and has been holed up in Tegucigalpa’s Brazilian Embassy since sneaking back into Honduras last month.
It is hoped the political crisis will be resolved before presidential elections, due to be held at the end of November.
Talking concessions
The thaw came after an OAS preparatory mission was allowed into the country on Friday.
The OAS has been pushing for a negotiated resolution that restores Mr Zelaya to power, and its secretary general, Jose Miguel Insulza, is due in the country on Wednesday to meet both sides.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Sham Marriage Boom After Judges Rule Home Office Crackdown is Illegal
Sham marriages are booming after judges relaxed laws designed to prevent them, figures show.
The number of illegal immigrants who stage fake ceremonies to stay in the country are likely to top 500 this year, the highest level since 2004.
Growing abuse of marriage laws appeared to have been stemmed that year after non-EU nationals were told they must apply for Home Office approval before marrying an EU citizen.
But last year Law Lords said the rules against fake marriages breached human rights and could deny genuine couples the right to marry.
The figures, an increase of 80 per cent compared with three years ago, were produced by the Home Office and disclosed by More4 News.
They showed that there were almost as many suspect marriages in the first six months of this year as in the whole of 2006.
In 2004 the Home Office counted more than 3,500 suspect marriages, each involving one European Union citizen with the right to live in Britain, and one non-EU resident marrying to gain the right to stay.
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
Demand the Arrest of Kevin Jennings
Many Americans logically anticipate the resignation of President Obama’s “Safe Schools” Czar Kevin Jennings of the US Department of Education. It was in his pedagogic capacity that Jennings advised a 15-year-old boy who was being sexually violated by an adult male, to submit to two years of abuse, and to thus risk a broad spectrum of venereal diseases including AIDS. Instead of reporting the crime to the police, as the law requires, Jennings advised the boy to use condoms during sodomy (unsafe, illegal). Hence:
- Jennings’ criminal conspiracies DISqualify him as Obama’s “safe schools” czar.
- Jennings’ criminal conspiracies DO qualify him for immediate arrest and trial.
- To suborn is to “induce (a person) to commit an unlawful or evil act.”
- Jennings suborned ongoing sex crimes against a minor (child sex abuse)
- Jennings was guilty of suborning “Child Abuse/Neglect and Endangerment.”
President Obama’s choice is known as the savvy community organizer who created GLSEN, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network as well as GLSTN, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Teachers’ Network.
Jennings’ criminal collusion in the boy’s years of rape was confirmed in an audiotape released by Fox News.
GLSEN is as it says, a “network,” organized to demonize the normal, natural sexual life. This network would limit employment in schools, libraries, youth groups, research grants, etc., to those who share their homoerotic visions.
[…]
GLSEN is as it says, a “network,” organized to demonize the normal, natural sexual life. This network would limit employment in schools, libraries, youth groups, research grants, etc., to those who share their homoerotic visions.
In 1996 one of the “network,” Gay and Lesbian Adolescent Social Services (GLASS), was exposed as systemically abusing children in their “five group homes.” The Washington Times reported:…
[Comments: WARNING: Graphic descriptions.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama’s ‘Safe Schools’ Chief Praised Child-Sex Promoter
Jennings: I was ‘inspired’ by NAMBLA’s Harry Hays
A transcript from a 1997 speech shows Office of Safe Schools chief Kevin Jennings in the U.S. Department of Education expressed his admiration for Harry Hay, one of the nation’s first homosexual activists who launched the Mattachine Society in 1948, founded the Radical Faeries and was a longtime advocate for the North American Man-Boy Love Association, NAMBLA.
“One of the people that’s always inspired me is Harry Hay,” the transcript shows Jennings saying, “who started the first ongoing gay rights groups in America. In 1948, he tried to get people to join the Mattachine Society. It took him two years to find one other person who would join.
“Well, [in] 1993,” Jennings continued, “Harry Hay marched with a million people in Washington, who thought he had a good idea 40 years before.”
WND has reported several times on Jennings’ homosexual activism, including his founding of the organization “Gay, Lesbian, Straight Education Network,” which advocates for homosexuality in public schools.
[…]
According to the archives of Concerned Women for America, when Hay died in 2002, no mainstream media outlets reported his advocacy for the pedophile activities of NAMBLA.
Hay also urged that NAMBLA, which advocates for the elimination of any “age of consent” restrictions, be considered mainstream in America.
“NAMBLA’s record as a responsible gay organization is well known. NAMBLA was spawned by the gay community and has been in every major gay and lesbian march. … NAMBLA’s call for the abolition of age of consent is not the issue. NAMBLA is a bona fide participant in the gay and lesbian movement. NAMBLA deserves strong support in its rights of free speech and association and its members’ protection from discrimination and bashing,” he said.
According to the Americans for Truth website, the incident involving the 15-year-old was just one among a series of egregious behaviors by Jennings.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Polanski’s Pedophile Paradise
I was shocked recently when reading a Huffington Post blog defending fugitive child rapist Roman Polanski, even though the Huffington Post is notorious for its far left views and borderline celebrity worship.
The blog, written by Joan Shore, presented the most reprehensible arguments imaginable in an attempt to absolve film director Polanski of drugging, raping and sodomizing a 13-year-old child! Again and again, the HP blog twists the facts of Polanski’s rape of this young girl to diminish the seriousness of his crime.
Incredibly, near the beginning of Shore’s blog, we read that she was able to “excuse” the Swiss for aiding and abetting the Nazis by allowing their “military trains to transit their country,” but said she could never forgive the Swiss for acting on an “extradition treaty with the U.S.” and seizing Polanski, an escaped felon. Really, Joan?
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Al Gore Drinks it, Barack Obama and Paris Hilton Drink it.
Mother Jones 01.09.2009 (USA)
Al Gore drinks it, Barack Obama and Paris Hilton drink it. High society loves it and so do the greens: Fiji mineral water: “Even though it’s shipped from the opposite end of the globe, even though it retails for nearly three times as much as your basic supermarket water, Fiji is now America’s leading imported water, beating out Evian,” writes Anna Lenzer in a breathtaking piece of reportage. “Nowhere in Fiji Water’s glossy marketing materials will you find reference to the typhoid outbreaks that plague Fijians because of the island’s faulty water supplies; the corporate entities that Fiji Water has — despite the owners’ talk of financial transparency — set up in tax havens like the Cayman Islands and Luxembourg; or the fact that its signature bottle is made from Chinese plastic in a diesel-fueled plant and hauled thousands of miles to its ecoconscious consumers. And, of course, you won’t find mention of the military junta for which Fiji Water is a major source of global recognition and legitimacy.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
CNN Plug-in: Immoral, Dangerous Software
It may sound like a monster from a deep-sea horror movie. It might read like the villainous organization from a spy thriller. Octoshape, however, is neither. It is, instead, a genuinely dangerous reality compared to these harmless fictions. It is nothing less than a means by which your computer may be used by other computers, against your will and without your knowledge, to do whatever the authors of the Octoshape software would like that PC to do.
For several months know, it has been known that CNN’s website was prompting users to download the Octoshape plug-in. This is peer-to-peer (p2p) software that CNN says it is “using to deliver higher quality video.” The reality is that Octoshape is a security risk. That risk is not found in the software’s misuse; it is inherent, implicit and integral to what the software does.
Octoshape is, for that matter, closed-source software, meaning that you, the user, and even those software professionals who might understand the source code behind that software if they had access to it, have no way of knowing exactly how the software does what it does. The only people who know that are the folks who wrote Octoshape, and they’re not telling.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UN Rights Body Approves US-Egypt Free Speech Text
GENEVA — The U.N. Human Rights Council approved a U.S.-backed resolution Friday deploring attacks on religions while insisting that freedom of expression remains a basic right.
The inaugural resolution sponsored by the U.S. since it joined the council in June broke a long-running deadlock between Western and Islamic countries in the wake of the publication of cartoons depicting the Muslim Prophet Muhammad.
The resolution has no effect in law but provides Muslim countries with moral ammunition the next time they feel central tenets of Islam are being ridiculed by Western politicians or media through “negative racial and religious stereotyping.”
American diplomats say the measure — co-sponsored by Egypt — is part of the Obama administration’s effort to reach out to Muslim countries.
“The exercise of the right to freedom of opinion and expression is one of the essential foundations of a democratic society,” the resolution states, urging countries to protect free speech by lifting legal restrictions, ensuring the safety of journalists, promoting literacy and preventing media concentration.
Rights groups cautiously welcomed the resolution as an improvement on earlier drafts, but said Egypt was in no position to lecture other countries about free speech as it has a poor record on the matter.
“Egypt’s cosponsorship of the resolution on freedom of expression is not the result of a real commitment to upholding freedom of expression,” said Jeremie Smith, Geneva director of the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies.
“If this were the case, freedom of expression would not be systematically violated on a daily basis in Egypt,” he said.
Others warned that the resolution appears to protect religions rather than believers and encourages journalists to abide by ill-defined codes of conduct.
“Unfortunately, the text talks about negative racial and religious stereotyping, something which most free expression and human rights organizations will oppose,” said Agnes Callamard, executive director of London-based group Article 19.
“The equality of all ideas and convictions before the law and the right to debate them freely is the keystone of democracy,” she said.
Although the resolution was passed unanimously, European and developing countries made it clear that they remain at odds on the issue of protecting religions from criticism.
Some Asian and African countries had called for stronger condemnation of articles, cartoons and videos they believe defames Islam.
| — Hat tip: Diana West | [Return to headlines] |
5 comments:
That's just plain bizarre that Ahmadinejad is jewish!
"That's just plain bizarre that Ahmadinejad is jewish!"
Not really when you consider things like this:
“Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's incendiary anti-Israel outbursts have united the international community against his country, thus serving a key Israeli interest, former Mossad chief Ephraim Halevy told an American-sponsored Arab satellite television network on Tuesday.
"Ahmadinejad is our greatest gift," Halevy told the Arab language television network Al-Hurra on Tuesday. "We couldn't carry out a better operation at the Mossad than to put a guy like Ahmadinejad in power in Iran."
Source
"Ahmadinejad is our greatest gift," Halevy told the Arab language television network Al-Hurra on Tuesday. "We couldn't carry out a better operation at the Mossad than to put a guy like Ahmadinejad in power in Iran."
If that is the case then it is hardly smart to divulge that Ahmadinejad i a Jew.
“If that is the case then it is hardly smart to divulge that Ahmadinejad i a Jew.”
The Daily Telegraph did that, not Israel or Mossad.
It was becoming common knowledge in the ME anyhow.
“The Iranian blogger who claimed President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has Jewish roots is being detained by the authorities after he was arrested along with 150 university students earlier this week, according to sources in Teheran...
The assertion featured in the bitter presidential election campaign, when rival reformist candidate Mehdi Karroubi challenged Ahmadinejad in a live TV debate, reportedly stating: "My full name is Mehdi Karroubi. What is your full name?"
Ahmadinejad gave his full name, according to an Al-Arabiya TV report, but left out one surname which is said to indicate Jewish ancestry.
The "Jewish Ahmadinejad" dispute even spread beyond Iran, when Bahrain's oldest newspaper, Akhbar al-Khaleej, was briefly shut down by the governing authorities two weeks ago after it published an article recycling the claim.”
Source
But here is another Israeli view on that ‘gift’ that is Ahmadinejad :
“No matter what the motive, many Iranian analysts believe their president's uncontrollable rage and hatred expressed in public are helping rather than hurting Israel; the Durban II conference just provided another piece of evidence.
These days, a saying attributed to an Israeli general is making the rounds among Iranians: "If Ahmadinejad is not on the Israeli payroll, he should be."
Source
Sentinel
Thanks for the info. It is wartime, and disinformation is the order of the day.
It really does not matter if Ahmed.. has Jewish roots. There were claims that Hitler had Jewish roots as well, for all the difference it made.
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