This IS good news for the Dinar and RV.. with Dinar built on a good hydrocarbon law.
With Allawi in it won't take them long..
It will mean prosperity for Iraq's people.
===
INTERVIEW - Iraq oil law a priority - PM hopeful Allawi
Khalid al-Ansary and Jim Loney
REUTERS - Mar 31, 2010
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Former Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi said on Wednesday he would honour deals signed with global oil majors in recent months and would move quickly to pass a new hydrocarbons law if his bloc forms the government.
But Allawi, whose cross-sectarian Iraqiya coalition won the greatest number of seats in Iraq's March 7 parliamentary election, said the deals might need some minor adjustments and he wanted to see more competition in Iraq's energy sector.
"We are going to honour all contracts. We are going to honour all agreements because we believe this is very important," Allawi told Reuters in an interview.
Iraq awarded billions of dollars of contracts to oil majors to refurbish its dilapidated oil fields after years of neglect and war. Baghdad's goal is to expand production capacity to 12 million barrels per day (bpd) in about six years from about 2.5 mln bpd now.
The contracts could catapult Iraq into the top ranks of global producers. The nation has the world's third-largest reserves but is just the 11th largest producer.
Companies involved in the deals include U.S. major Exxon Mobil Corp; Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Europe's largest oil company; Russia's Lukoil; and China National Petroleum Corp.
Allawi lamented Iraq's lack of an oil and gas law to govern the sector and said he would move quickly to put one before parliament.
"It will definitely be a priority," Allawi said. "It won't take us long."
"STRONG RESERVATIONS"
Allawi, who led a transitional government in 2004-05, said he had "strong reservations" about the way the government headed by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki handled the contracts.
"But the agreements have been signed. We have to respect them and we have to honour them, maybe with little adjustments here and there," Allawi said.
Asked what kind of adjustments, he said he had concerns about whether the contracts were handled "with full integrity" on the Iraqi side. He also wanted to see the sector opened up to more competition.
Allawi said he would like a hydrocarbons council of experts similar to one he instituted as prime minister to oversee the sector rather than just the oil minister.
"We want to have, ultimately, the ministry as a regulator rather than an operator and the operations should be handled by the private sector and the investors," Allawi said.
"There is a lot of scope for other companies to come into Iraq. We need heavy investment."
AT LOGGERHEADS
He blamed Iraq's central government for disagreements that have hampered the development of the oil industry, including one between Baghdad and the semi-autonomous northern Kurdistan region.
The Kurdish government and Baghdad have been at loggerheads for months over oil deals Iraqi Kurdistan signed independently with foreign oil firms, which the central government says was illegal.
Oil exports were halted as the Kurdish regional government and Baghdad fought over revenue and production-sharing. The region's natural resources minister said a week ago that it was ready to start exporting oil as soon as a new central government was formed.
"There were squabbles between the central government and the regional government in Kurdistan and we lost a lot of time because of these problems and it was initiated by the central government here," Allawi said.
"We need to bring this to a halt. We need to get this (oil and gas law) very fast through the parliament."
Thanks, Tony.
Let's hope so.
Today's Iraqi news I found of interest:
===
Trade Bank of Iraq doubles credit limit
01 April 2010
The Trade Bank of Iraq has doubled the maximum value of letters of credit it allocates to the private banking sector in response to a strong increase in demand for cross-border trade finance in Iraq.
Read more: [Trade Bank of Iraq credit] [TBI letters of credit] [TBI trade finance LC] [TBI doubled value LC]
The Trade Bank of Iraq (TBI) has doubled the maximum value of letters of credit (LC) it allocates to the private banking sector from $2 million to $4 million, in response to a strong increase in demand for cross-border trade finance in Iraq.
The increase in financing will allow 18 private Iraqi banks to increase the size and range of the business activities they finance for...
Maliki fights to hold power, risks sectarian war in Iraq
BAGHDAD – Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki’s postelection strategy suggests he is prepared for a long and bitter fight to hold on to power, even if it alienates the country’s Sunni community and risks new sectarian warfare.
The Iraqi leader is trying all sorts of legal maneuvers to deny victory to his chief opponent, former prime minister Ayad Allawi, whose secular, nationalist bloc won the most parliamentary seats in the March 7 elections and presumably the right to try to form a new government.
Even if Al-Maliki sticks with nominally legal measures, he risks serious damage to all the efforts to ease sectarian tensions which had begun to bear fruit three years after the US troop surge. A resurgence of major violence would complicate US plans to withdraw all its forces from Iraq by the end of next year.
The showdown has cast a spotlight on Iraq’s judicial process, which some have said is far from independent and often subject to outside pressures. And in such a young democracy with little institutional knowledge or precedent upon which to draw, the constitution and laws passed by parliament are not always clear.
No issue is potentially more explosive than a committee’s attempts to disqualify some winning candidates because of ties to Saddam Hussein’s regime. Sunnis view the committee, led by a Shiite with ties to the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, as nothing other than a group dedicated to purging Sunnis from government.
While Al-Maliki does not directly control the committee, he has certainly benefited from its actions and has done little to deter it. At least four candidates targeted by the committee are from Allawi’s party list, which includes many Sunnis and won significant voter support from the minority sect. If a court disqualifies enough candidates to tilt the race in Al-Maliki’s favor, that would be a huge provocation to Sunnis.
Even before the final vote tallies were announced Friday, Al-Maliki was maneuvering to put himself in a better position, likely sensing the results were not going his way.
The prime minister went to the Supreme Court Thursday and asked for a legal definition of what constitutes the largest bloc. The constitution says the coalition with the largest bloc in parliament gets the first crack at forming a government.
Allawi’s Iraqiya list has argued that this means their 91 seats – Al-Maliki’s State of Law list won 89 – give them the first opportunity.
But the court ruled that the largest bloc could also be one created after election day through negotiations, giving Al-Maliki time to find new partners and outmaneuver Allawi.
If Al-Maliki forms a government with a rival Shiite bloc, excluding Iraqiya entirely, Sunnis could feel disenfranchised, said Meghan L. O’Sullivan, a professor at Harvard University’s Kennedy School and a former deputy national security adviser on Iraq for President George W.Bush. – AP
the court ruled that the largest bloc could also be one created after election day through negotiations, giving Al-Maliki time to find new partners and outmaneuver Allawi.
Imagine if this happened in the USA.. that a candidate won the Presidency, but it was found that if another could put together an alliance with more elected officials he could take the Presidency from him. How fair and honest would that seem to those who were declared the winner and their supporters, the majority vote? Certainly, it would make for bitterness and rivalry such as this country never experiences.
Does it seem wise to you for Maliki to do this?
Does it put the country of Iraq, its people and its interests above seeking power?
Concerning Maliki's rule, the Kurds here say, "Iraq cannot afford another four years of political stagnation."
The Dinar holders here have also felt there was stagnation under Maliki, including financially and economically, which could have been alleviated.
Allawi should do much better.. for all the Iraqis including the Kurdish area discussed below, because he has indicated he will tackle those problem areas we have long hoped they would resolve, such as a proper Dinar valuation, the oil law, and true Iraqi value in the strength of their international trade, etc.
Sara.
===
Iraq's Kurds want a voice in exchange for support
April 1, 2010
By ADAM SCHRECK
Associated Press Writer
SULAIMANIYAH, Iraq -- After years of what they consider unfulfilled promises, Iraq's Kurds are hardening their demands to wring out the best deal from prospective allies following an election that has left the country's future government unclear and the Kurds' support more prized than ever.
In interviews this week in their self-rule northern region, Kurdish leaders and voters demanded real concessions on contentious issues many feel have been left to wither under previous postwar governments, including that of longtime ally Nouri al-Maliki.
Heading into the March 7 vote, a Kurdish alliance with al-Maliki's Shiite supporters was seen as the most logical choice. A shared resentment over perceived second-class treatment under Saddam Hussein's Sunni-dominated rule helped seal that bond.
But the results that thrust Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite who relied on significant Sunni support, into the front-runner's spot have changed that dynamic.
Many Kurds - who have been increasingly alienated from al-Maliki because of differences with the central government over oil contracts and other issues - say they are now willing to shift alliances to maintain a voice in Baghdad despite the nationalist stance of many Allawi supporters.
"We haven't seen any benefit from al-Maliki. He hasn't done anything for the Iraqi people, let alone the Kurds. Let's try Allawi. At least it's a change," said Twan Mohammed, 35, a mobile phone card salesman in Sulaimaniyah.
The speed with which high-ranking officials from the leading coalitions raced up to the three-province Kurdish region in the days after the election for a 325-member parliament emphasizes just how important the U.S.-allied minority's support will be.
Allawi went to the Kurdish region at least twice, and met with President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, in Baghdad on Wednesday. Vice President Adel Abdul-Mahdi, a member of the Shiite-led Iraqi National Alliance, traveled north as well, while al-Maliki appeared in a chummy meeting before television cameras in Baghdad with Talabani.
But Kurdish support won't come cheap.
"We must be very serious in terms of the commitments that will be extracted from any future government," regional Prime Minister Barham Saleh said in an interview in his office in the regional capital Irbil. "Iraq cannot afford another four years of political stagnation."
Some Kurdish officials are demanding that any agreements with would-be suitors in forming an inclusive power-sharing government be put down firmly in writing as a condition of their support.
"In previous alliances, the Kurds have made the mistake of making agreements without signing any documents," said Fadhil Mirany, a senior official from the Kurdistan Democratic Party, which is allied with Talabani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan. "We won't make the same mistake this time."
Also still to be resolved is the fate of oil and gas contracts Kurds have signed without Baghdad's approval. The lack of a national oil law has left the legality of those lucrative deals in limbo.
"These are the issues that affect the economic realities of Kurdish society," said Hiwa Mirza Saber, a senior member of the Kurdistan Islamic Union.
Kurdish leaders declined to be more specific about their demands as they play the field by talking with all the major vote-getting blocs in heated jockeying to decide who will lead Iraq as U.S. troops leave.
Iraq's fragmented political landscape plays to the Kurds' advantage, although followers of anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada al-Sadr also have emerged as key powerbrokers.
No electoral alliance came even close to a parliamentary majority - making the support of the Kurds invaluable during efforts to cobble together a coalition government.
Allawi's Iraqiya bloc got the most seats, with 91, but that was just two more than al-Maliki's State of Law coalition. The leading Kurdish alliance, meanwhile, picked up 43 seats, while smaller Kurdish parties claimed another 14 combined.
Kurds are known for their political unity in Baghdad. While an upstart political party called Gorran - Change in English - has broken the lock on power held by the two traditional parties, its leader indicated they would likely stick together on core demands on the national stage even as they disagree on local issues.
"On common issues, we'll support them. But we won't support them on points of dispute," Gorran head Nosherwan Mustafa said in an interview in his Sulaimaniyah home.
While Kurdish leaders say they are committed to remaining part of a federal Iraq, separatist sentiments remain high. Portraits of Talabani and Kurdish regional President Massoud Barzani are the only leaders on display in hotel lobbies and market stalls in this rapidly developing city, where a huge Kurdish, not Iraqi, flag dominates the downtown skyline.
Much is at stake. American military commanders have described tensions between Kurds and Arabs as the greatest threat to Iraq's security as the U.S. steps up troop withdrawals this year.
Many Kurds are insisting that they retain the federal presidency, a ceremonial but still evolving role. Talabani wants to return to the post despite complaints by supporters of Allawi's winning coalition it ought to be in the hands of Iraq's Arab majority. The current president and his deputies have veto power, but are expected to lose that once the new government is formed.
"This is the window in history where they can secure major concessions," Mustafa Alani, an Iraqi analyst at the Gulf Research Center in the United Arab Emirates, said of the Kurds. "Their support will come at a very high price."
High on the agenda, as always, is the resolution of long-standing disagreements over disputed territory, particularly the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, to Kurdish satisfaction. But that could prove more difficult after Kurds split electoral control of Kirkuk's Tamim province with Allawi's bloc after years in the majority.
Kurds say they want the next government to abide by Iraq's young and largely untested constitution, which includes provisions for a referendum to settle Kirkuk's future along with other protections.
They are also demanding greater clarity on the role of, and more funding for, regional security forces known as the peshmerga, many of whom are former militia members who fought Saddam and complain of lower pay and fewer resources than their Iraqi army counterparts.
I do see two assholes and they are the tyrannts King George W. Bush and the court jester Barack Hussein Obama. These tyrannts have bankrupt the United States by printing paper currency that has no value. We continue on the path of perpetual war in an attempt to enslave the middle east in a Western style socailist regime. Al-Malaki and now Allawi like Saddam Hussein are puppets of this tyrannt government. The government of Allawi will continue the same policies as Al-Malaki while keeping the people impoverished and no purchasing power.
I criticize this government because their foreign policy in Iraq and in the middle east in general is and has been an absolute disaster. The United States and its interference have been the reason for the destablization in the region. It is my hope the U.S. sees defeat in both Iraq and Afghanistan; the bully in the neighborhood must be ganged up upon and cast out of the region. Neither China or Russia will not cooperate with the U.S. concerning sanctions because they realize the U.S. does not belong in the region.
Has anyone but me figured out this blog is really a psychologist experiment to see haw random strangers react on the internet?
Thanks for that, it gives context to something the Lord said to me yesterday which I wasn't quite sure what He meant. He said, "They think you will be judged by their standards, not they by Mine." If these psychologists think their psychology will stand the test as ultimate truth and will be the measure by which they and all mankind will be measured, they are very, very mistaken. The discipline of psycho-babble-ology, founded by the observations of men and their interpretations of the world - such as Freud - are never going to stand up as ultimate truth. Wikipedia says of this man and his "truth" concerning his life and where he received his "truth" or insights into human behavior,
Quote:
Carl Jung initiated the rumor that a romantic relationship may have developed between Freud and his sister-in-law, Minna Bernays, who had moved into Freud's apartment at 19 Berggasse in 1896.[12] (Psychologist Hans Eysenck has suggested that the affair resulted in a pregnancy and a subsequent abortion for Miss Bernays.[13]) The publication in 2006 of a Swiss hotel log, dated 13 August 1898, has suggested to some Freudian scholars (including Peter Gay) that there was a factual basis to these rumors.[14]
In his 40s, Freud "had numerous psychosomatic disorders as well as exaggerated fears of dying and other phobias" (Corey 2001, p. 67). During this time, Freud was involved in the task of exploring his own dreams, memories, and the dynamics of his personality development. During this self-analysis, he came to realize the hostility he felt towards his father, Jacob Freud, who had died in 1896,[15]. He also recalled "his childhood sexual feelings for his mother, Amalia Freud, who was attractive, warm, and protective" (Corey 2001, p. 67). He considered this time of emotional difficulty to be the most creative time in Freud's life.
For those following this man and his ideas as a description of the truth in this life and building with his work their life (personally, professionally), that is the character and nature of him, as opposed to the character and nature of Jesus Christ, which Christians follow. Freud's "insights" such as those into his "exaggerated fears of dying and other phobias" as well as all the other psychologist's human observations will go by the wayside as any pop trend in that Final Day. All that men build with in this life will be tested with fire, and those which are wanting concerning ultimate Truth will be burnt up:
1Co 3:13 Every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is.
1Co 3:14 If any man's work stands which he has built upon, he shall receive a reward.
1Co 3:15 If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire.
So if there is an "experiment" being done in this life, it is being done by God, who holds all men's lives in His hands.. and He is their ultimate Judge. This is why when men seek to put anyone or anything, even psychology, in place of His Judgement and Truth, we say they are playing God because we all know the real "game" in this life is the Judgement God will make, which will be true, ultimate and binding. And the religion of Christianity will see which of us comes out the other side with a reward - those who have lived by the Good Book, or those who live their lives by the Judgements of the psychobabble observations and reasonings of such men, and attempt to impose those judgements on other men.
1Ti 6:20 O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called:
This is yet another false "science" professing to be Truth in the areas of studying human relationships and personality, when it is a lie. And, as any false science does, it sets itself in opposition to the real truth, and will be manifest and found wanting in the Day of Judgement.. and ultimately discarded, or burnt up.
Well, it looks like Tony Perkins, and the Family Research Council are pulling away their support from the Republican National Committee, over the Lesbian Bondage Club scandal. Tony Perkins is a republican bigwig with evangelicals, and represents the base of the Republican Party.
My Perkins and other social conservatives in the Republican Party are horrified by the behavior of the RNC.
Of course, because Mr. Steele, centre of the scandal is black, and Republicans have trouble getting minority votes, and Mr. Steele is the first black head of the Republican Party, it will look awful if the Republicans fire the first black leader of the party.
And Sara Palin just canceled appearing at an event sponsored by the RNC.....
Even she wants nothing to do with the losers that run the Republican Party.
So, it looks like the Republicans are self-destructing.
I always figured they would.
But I learned a few things from this Republican Lesbian Bondage Sex Scandal.
I now know why the Republicans tried to stall and tie up Health Care Reform....they are into bondage, after all....
But the Republican Lesbian Sex Scandal is not all bad. Spending all that money on strippers must be good for the economy......Talk about your Stimulus Package!!!
Meine Freund, All za Republican Sex Scandals make me think I should hang out with Republicans. They are into kinky sex, just like me. Remember my theory about my sexual attraction for my mother? It's in all the college text books, you know. Well, it turned out she was into other things...She joined the Wiccans, got hooked up with some Lesbians, and is putting on a play called My Jewish Mother's Wiccan Lesbian Wedding. It's za hoot. They even serve Matzo Balls at the reception. The family say, "She has gone Republican"
So, in the news tonite, The Republican Party in Minnesota sent out fund raising mail to thousands of households, with a phone numbers to call, for people to give money to the Republican Party, ...Prospective Republican donors were surprised, when they called the Toll Free Number, to find it was a Phone Sex Line, and a sultry young female voice answered, "Hey Big Boy,ri bet you want a really good time with a hot young woman. I'm blonde, and 23. My name is Britainy."
I didn't hear the rest of the call, but I wouldn't be surprised if it went, "Press 1 for Bondage", "Press 2 to talk to Larry "Wide Stance" Craig, "Press 3 for Lesbian Dominatrixes"
The New Republican Motto: Sticks and Stones may Break my Bones, but Whips and Chains Excite Me!
Been a bit busy, whatawe got'ere.... a new sex scandal, well nothing is new on this planet. Helen of Troy brought on a war, and that was 3500 years ago.( The movie "Troy" was good also)
Malaki have gone into the whining mode and are trying to save his sinking ship. Too late I am afraid.
He needs to leave the Iraqi scene now, it's been about as much development in Iraq under his regime, as the development of intelligent life in a stale pond of water.
A jokster claimed the Dinar was on the Forex now, well it was during the 1s of April so the jokster is excused.
The Dinar would probably not go into the Majors leage, at least not at first.
The smaller currencies are usualy only introduced into bigger dealers offering at first, once they are getting into , and will be accepted onto the trade market.
That is, when it makes the step up to being offered by dealers in the first place.
Most probably the Iraqi Dinar will be offered to close by banks, in Iraq and the neighbouring countries, most likely then in Lebanon, Jordan Kuwait, and selected gulf states.
Perhaps the first opening sales of it would be in bigger orcestrated funds, meaning it comes in packages, and not as single currency units at first.
It's a step by step process to get it going.
The fact that it is suppose to get in on the open market in the first place is probably a first for an Arabic currency, and very encouriging, for the currency in general.
The most traded currencies are not that many, USD/GDP/JPY/EUR are the very main currencies that are traded. You can go down the list on bigger brokers currency offerings and see exotic currencies.
The first time it hits the market will be interesting, I am curious of how CBI want to do the set up.
Go slow with funds, a first, or just letting it go.
The downside with a free traded currency is that its exchange rate is much more volatile, and will experience swings back and forth, that is something a Central Bank hates.
Central Bank interference is something you see much more in the Asian/Nz/Australian side of the world.
The Central Banks over there are almost in a daily fight for dampening volatility, and I wonder if just by the fact that the central Banks are there manipulating it the whole time, makes the currency so volatile in the first place.
Singapore, HonKong, Taipe and Tokyo are all in direct competition with each other, because of their current status as producers of ....well I was just going to say ...cheap shit, but good stuff is coming out of there now. At least Japan have quality stuff ( go Toyota go.....ops....it stopped) and Chinese stuff is today much better than it was only 10 years ago.
Nevertheless, it is a region that produces pots and pans, and as such, their currency will benefit from being as cheap as possible, in order for their products to sell.
The point that I wil be very curious to see is to what extent CBI will try to control it's currency after it is introduced on the market.
It's a contradiction in itself that a Central Bank will try to control a currency one let lose.
It's like a well intended attempt from moms side to control her 5, 6, 7 and 8 year old kids from a cell phone from a parking lot while the kids (on a complete sugar + caffeine high, from chunking down two Mountain Dew's each) are rummaging the neighborhoods store Kids R Us.
Good luck.
That will be a very intresting dvelopment, I am monitoring the Forex pretty good, and occasionally I go down the list of exotic currencies.
One thing for sure though, the fist time I see it on the bidding board, I will place a trade, and go fully betted.(probably with as much leverage as I have nerve to, also)
What else do we have on the board today.
Rob N, and his clarity of who is evil and who is not.....it's all bad isn't it?
Admit it Rob N. you really don't care about the cheese, you just want to get out of the trap.
Bush, Obama or the US foreign policy is not the source of your miseries.
I don't particularly care for John Lennon, I think he was naive in many ways, but in this case I think you could learn from his mantra, ....all you need is love.
No, really Rob N, you really don't love anything.
I realy wish that one day you could have a belly laugh at something, one of those uncontrollable laughs, where you can't stop laughing.
The risk of sectarian war in Iraq if Malaki will try to milk it and stay as long as he can??
You can never say never, but I think the possibiity of an all out war is very slim now, the Iraqis have changed and developed, they are not what we were looking at by the time of the invasion, or by the time of the insurgency.
America is still a player in Iraq, as long as we have troops there. That means America has influence over the elections. America CANNOT decide the winner, but we can enforce the rules. The rules say, whoever has the most votes, wins. That's not Maliki. Maliki can whine all he wants, he still lost. He can't hold on to power without pisses off the U.S. He can recount all he want, but if he lost, he lost, so he can go gracefully, or be removed by force. There were U.N. monitors around making sure the vote was fair, and it was. Allawi won. Maliki lost. The U.S. can't be seem propping up the second place Maliki, and it would look bad for America if they did. If Maliki is worried about his future, the U.S. should provide him with sanctuary and a good pension, in the U.S., or any place he cares to live. Also if any of his buddies that lost are worried about their future, the U.S. should quietly offer them safe passage and a good pension for themselves and their families, to whatever country they want to leave to. If Maliki doesn't want to hand over power peacefully, he has to be forcefully removed. Enough with the nice talk. That jerk has held up the Hydrocarbon Law, upon which the future of Iraq and the Dinar depend. That loser has had a few years to get his shit together, he can't handle the job. Iraq can wait no more for a bright future. The future of Iraq, and the future of the $1 TRILLION DOLLARS AMERICAN INVESTMENT IN IRAQ IS ON THE LINE IN THE NEXT FEW WEEKS. The fate of our investment will be decided in the next few years. If there is a peaceable transition of power, our investment is secure and will go off like a rocket in the next 2 years, or less. A good future for Iraq must start NOW, not in 4 more years. Throw the bum Maliki out on his ass if he won't go peaceably.
The world seeks balance. Rob N understands that. He's a "sensitive man". He hates injustice. He wants the weak to stand up to the strong. Rob is a very moral man. He thinks the U.S. is a bully. Nothing wrong with that view. But for every great evil, there must be a great good in the world.
What is the great good in the world? Is the world all shit Rob? Is there nothing to believe in? God? 7-11 Slurpees? Goat cheese? Allah? The New York Yankees? Paris Hilton? Republican meetings at Lesbian Bondage Clubs?
The Government of Iraq just announced this morning, the creation of a semi-independent, autonomous region, in the north-east corner of Iraq, for malcontents like Osama bin Laden and Rob N, and Maliki, to live with other malcontents. It will be called The Republic of Turdistan.
I found your post dated March 23, 2010 10:29 PM very interesting. As a reminder, it was about Iraqi customs no longer allowing currency to be couriered in or out of the country. You mentioned that they still allow it to be posted, which to me seems very risky.
I still have some NIDs that I would like to send to my account at Warka. I guess my choices now are:
1. Try to sell them on ebay and wire the money to my account.
2. Wait for them to RV and take them into my bank and declare them.
3. Bin them or keep them as souvenirs.
I'm not sure how in demand Dinars are these days on ebay. Taking them into my bank may raise a few questions, and my taxes. I'm not too bothered about the taxes as long as they leave me with something to live off.
I liked Troy as well, Brad Pitt did an excellent job in the title role as the blonde. The Tea Parties are a reminder to both parties that it is the values, not the party. They are not affiliated with any party for a reason. I think we are all tired of what came to be known as RINOs.. Republican In Name Onlys. And the recent Stupak cave-in showed many that Democrats professing an issue can also turn on their base for political means. Certainly, this Steele fits the description of RINO, not following what the party says it stand for. But it is any Progressive which is the real harm. They do not really believe in the American Experiment and are invasive like cancer into any organization. I think the people have to find out what a candidate truly stands for and support the ones which are deserving of their vote. I would not vote for anyone who voted for the Healthcare bill, period. And I would not blindly vote for a candidate who is Republican, but would check out what they stand for and truly believe, regardless of party, then vote for the ones deserving my vote. I have only had one candidate for office who would not answer my questions.. he would not give me a yes or no answer, and I asked him three times. Most of them will let you know where they stand on the issues, and you can vote from there.
I appreciate your insights on the Dinar going on the forex, and your daily checking of it, Roger. I am appreciative that when it happens, you will let us know pretty soon afterward.. thanks. Also, the point you made about it getting interbank traded first is an important one. I noted that you said once it came on there, you would jump in with both feet and grab up Dinar. I think you are not alone. I think it will be driven up quickly. I also appreciated your points on Maliki needing to leave which were echoed so eloquently by the sentiments expressed by "Makes sense and dollars".. super. :)
As for RobN, I agree with the others who have posted on this - RobN, I ask you then who is doing it (life) correctly, in your view? Who is the "champion" you see in this drama of life? Obviously not the US or the freedom and prosperity it has given to the people who have embraced the founding principles of it. You knock down the only champion there is.. to set up.. who? In its place you would set up Islamic fundamentalist terrorists? Chinese Communists? Cuba and its repressive policies toward its people? If the US is corrupt, is the answer to destroy it, or to return it to its roots, in your view? Is the best you can offer in its place.. to live under a regime such as Iran? Is that the ultimate freedom you wish for Iraq and the Middle East.. to live under a repressive dictatorship, like Iran? If so, can you explain to me why the Iraqis are not all immigrating to Iran to live in your professed peace and freedom? Why did the Iraqis fight a war long and hard against Iran, and why you are not living there, yourself - since you advocate it as a true bastion of freedom?
It is one thing to say the US needs to get back to its roots - back to its former glory which made the country great, but another thing entirely to say throw the baby out with the bathwater. I think you don't even see the baby anymore, you hate the baby along with the dirty bathwater. They are both equally as dirty in your mind and so they should be thrown away.. most of us say, no way. We can see the baby and think it should stay.. though we all admit (from Steele on to any other scandals, of which there have been many, mostly involving Democrats and so they are not sensationalized, John Edwards comes to mind..) that there are those whose corruption needs removing from the political scene. Cleaning up the act, not shutting down the theatre, is what most unradicalized people advocate. There are good people out there who can steer the country in a proper direction. It is those people who should be voted in and the corrupt one voted out.. in BOTH parties. No Progressives should make the cut in November.. and that means any of those who voted to destroy states rights by voting for the unconstitutional Healthcare bill. Note in the article below that those now standing for the right side (states rights) who are Republicans have in the past stood against this same issue (against states rights) in the past, showing their hypocrisy. They need to be voted out - the people who vote for them need to do their homework, find out where they have voted on the issues and not allow them back in. It is systemic, and there needs to be people who have principle who remain true to the founding values of the Constitution in power, not these people, whether they are Republican or Democrat. If too many Progressives get in, the agenda of removing states rights will prevail and the American Experiment will come to an end. Then, truly, we will have thrown the baby out with the bathwater and will no longer live in what the founders envisioned, but under a ever tightening form of Socialism/Communism.
===
Is mandate constitutional? If the individual health insurance mandate survives court challenges, states’ rights will have withered before our eyes.
By Jonathan Turley
The new health care law has states and citizens lining up — but not quite in the way President Obama or Congress had hoped. Across the country, lawsuits are being filed that could have sweeping implications, not just for health care but our constitutional system. To date, 14 states have joined the stampede to the courthouse to challenge the legislation. One of the most contested issues is the so-called individual mandate under which Congress has ordered all citizens to get medical insurance or face fines. Though the federal government has the clear advantage in such litigation, these challenges should not be dismissed as baseless political maneuvering. There is a legitimate concern for many that this mandate constitutes the greatest (and perhaps the most lethal) challenge to states' rights in U.S. history.
With this legislation, Congress has effectively defined an uninsured 18-year-old man in Richmond as an interstate problem like a polluting factory. It is an assertion of federal power that is inherently at odds with the original vision of the Framers. If a citizen who fails to get health insurance is an interstate problem, it is difficult to see the limiting principle as Congress seeks to impose other requirements on citizens. The ultimate question may not be how Congress can prevail, but how much of states' rights would be left if it prevailed.
Hypocrisy rears its head
To get to the constitutional question, you first have to strip away the deep layer of hypocrisy in Washington. Many lawmakers now screaming about the sanctity of federalism voted for prior laws that were overturned by the Supreme Court on federalism grounds. Moreover, few of these mostly Republican members uttered a word of support when states opposed federal interventions on medical marijuana and physician-assisted suicide during the Bush administration. The guarantee of federalism was essential to ratifying the Constitution and embodied in the 10th Amendment guaranteeing that "powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people." Historically, however, federalism is a constitutional rule honored largely in the breach by Congress.
For states' rights advocates, the Constitution is like a contract that is openly violated by one party with impunity. On paper, the states remain sovereign powers, while in reality the federal government appears able to dictate everything from the ingredients of school lunches to speed limits. Congress now routinely collects taxes in order to return the money to the states with conditions on their conforming to federal demands. Congress would need to show that the failure of an individual to get medical insurance constitutes an interstate commerce matter.
To be sure, the Supreme Court has stretched the meaning of interstate commerce to cover such things as the farmers growing wheat for their own consumption. Indeed, many long ago wrote off federalism as a rather quaint and outmoded concept. In Wickard v. Filburn (1942), Roscoe Filburn was growing wheat to feed his chickens, but the Supreme Court still defined the activity as interstate commerce because his crops reduced the amount of wheat on the open (and national) market. However, this was at least a traditional commercial activity. With the newly minted health care law, Congress is effectively ordering a citizen to buy a product and treating the uninsured citizen himself as an interstate problem in the same way Congress regulates endangered species.
'Inference upon inference'
When Congress has ventured outside of traditional commercial areas, it has run into trouble. For example, in 1990, Congress criminalized certain conduct as part of its Gun-Free School Zones Act. The Supreme Court struck it down in 1995 and held that such laws did not substantially relate to interstate commerce. The court refused to "pile inference upon inference" to find an interstate claim.
This brings us back to that 18-year-old Virginian. Congress is declaring the failure to insure oneself to be an interstate matter. There is no question that being uninsured contributes to the national crisis in health care. If that 18-year-old has a car accident, it is the public that is likely to bear the costs of his care. However, if the failure to get insurance makes one the object of federal jurisdiction, it is hard to see the why other acts of omission will not be tied to national deficiencies in public health or education or family welfare.
Though strong arguments can be made for health care reform and the individual mandate, these are matters that should not be decided by mere fiat of Congress but rather by the courts. Federalism was already on life support before the individual mandate. Make no mistake about it, this plan might provide a bill of good health for the public, but it could amount to a "do not resuscitate" order for federalism.
Jonathan Turley, the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University, is a member of USA TODAY's Board of Contributors.
if the failure to get insurance makes one the object of federal jurisdiction, it is hard to see the why other acts of omission will not be tied to national deficiencies in public health or education or family welfare
That should scare anyone who believes in American values and freedom. Where will it stop.. dictatorship control of every aspect of our lives? Hello to the book 1984.. only it will have taken slightly later in time to get to that regime.
U.S. says Iraq PM will follow law on election
Mar 30, 2010
WASHINGTON - The US ambassador to Iraq voiced confidence Tuesday that Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki would abide by the law despite his mounting criticism of what he alleges is election fraud.
Ambassador Christopher Hill renewed his defense of the March 7 election, dismissing charges that there was ballot-stuffing in the vote that put Maliki's bloc a whisker behind rival Iyad Allawi's forces.
Maliki "has been very clear with us in private and very clear in public that he will follow the law," Hill told reporters in Washington by videolink from Baghdad.
"The Iraqi people went to the polls in great numbers and I think the Iraqi people expect all of their politicians -- whether it's the prime minister or whether it's the challenger -- to follow the letter of the law," Hill said.
Hill downplayed suggestions the political row could descend into violence, saying that Iraq was a rare place in the region where candidates have agreed to abide by voters' mandate.
"This is a country that has had a recent history with violence, so it is quite understandable that people look at this question," Hill said. "But so far it is very much on a political track, which is where we want to keep it."
Hill said he was not surprised that Maliki was contesting the results.
"It's not easy to lose a close election," Hill said. "I don't think people should be too surprised that there (are) some comments that reflect the anguish of losing."
The United States, which overthrew Saddam Hussein's regime in a 2003 invasion, is keen to see a smooth transition.
Under President Barack Obama's plan, all combat troops will leave Iraq in about five months as the administration puts a growing focus on Afghanistan.
Hill said that the United States was ready to work with whoever emerged as the head of the next government.
"I want to make very clear, the US does not have a favorite in this election," Hill said. "We are prepared to work with whoever is democratically elected, whoever observes democratic rules and is able to emerge from this process."
Helping keep the elections on schedule, and the oil sector moving along..
===
6 suspected Al-Qaeda leaders killed or arrested in Iraq
By REUTERS
Published: Apr 2, 2010
BAGHDAD: US and Iraqi troops have killed or arrested at least six suspected Al-Qaeda leaders allegedly involved in an extortion and assassination ring in northern Iraq, the US military said.
The suspected militants were killed or arrested in security operations from March 18 to 24 in Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad and an Al-Qaeda stronghold, it said in a statement late on Thursday.
The suspects were accused of involvement in an extortion and assassination network that helped fund Al-Qaeda around Mosul. Its targets included oil companies and small businesses, the statement said.
Those killed were identified as the Al-Qaeda emir of northern Iraq, Khalid Muhammad Hasan Shallub Al-Juburi; economic security emir Abu Ahmad Al-Afri; and the suspected Al-Qaeda governor of Mosul, Bashar Khalaf Husyan Ali Al-Jaburi.
The military said three top suspected oil-extortion figures were among a dozen people arrested on March 24 in a security sweep.
"Without these individuals in the AQI (Al-Qaeda in Iraq) network, it is expected that AQI's ability to operate and restructure will be severely hindered," it said.
The joint US-Iraqi operations were carried out pursuant to a warrant from an Iraqi judge.
Iraq Sadrists go to polls in PM referendum
Apr 02, 2010
BAGHDAD - Polls opened in a ballot of Iraq's Sadrists on Friday over who should be the country's leader, while ex-premier Iyad Allawi received a boost after a key Shiite party backed his bloc for government.
A week after results from Iraq's March 7 parliamentary elections were announced, Allawi's Iraqiya bloc and sitting Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's State of Law Alliance are battling to be the first to form a government.
The pair, the main candidates for the prime minister post, will both be competing for the backing of supporters of cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in the movement's two-day unofficial "referendum."
"There are major conflicts in the Iraqi political landscape over choosing the prime minister because of the competition between winning lists," Falah Shanshal, a senior Sadrist MP, told AFP.
"Moqtada al-Sadr, when he issued this statement, called people to this referendum so that the final decision would be made by the Iraqi people."
While the plebiscite is nominally open to all Iraqis, the vast majority of voters will likely be Sadrist backers.
Alongside Allawi and Maliki, the latter of whom is a bitter Sadrist enemy, Maliki's predecessor Ibrahim al-Jaafari is also on the ballot.
Vice President Adel Abdel Mahdi and Jaafar al-Sadr, the son of an ayatollah who founded Maliki's Islamic Dawa Party and was assassinated by Saddam's regime in 1980, are also among the candidates.
The vote opened Friday morning and was set to conclude Saturday evening, with results expected within days.
"People coming here are happy, they are treating it like a festival because they are practicing their right to choose their prime minister," said Saleh Jizani, the head of a voting centre in Shuala, north Baghdad.
Haidar Sattar, a 23-year-old off-duty policeman, said he cast his ballot for Jaafar al-Sadr, whom he described as a "moderate."
"I hope that the eventual prime minister will be a good, reasonable man who does not offend Iraqis and serves everyone, without exception," Sattar said.
Sadrist officials, in addition to stationary voting stations, were also seen carrying ballot boxes around Baghdad, stopping people on the street and arriving on locals' doorsteps to ask them to vote.
The results will give the Sadrists, whose 30-something leader has been in Iran for about two years, ammunition in negotiations with other blocs to form a government, particularly with State of Law and Maliki.
The rivals share a deep hostility that transcends their otherwise shared sectarian roots and centralising tendencies, due largely to a military offensive ordered by Maliki in 2008 against the Mahdi Army, the movement's armed wing.
None of the four main blocs -- Iraqiya, State of Law, the Iraqi National Alliance (INA) of which the Sadrists are the largest faction, and Kurdistania, comprising the autonomous Kurdish region's two long-dominant blocs -- are close to forming a majority on their own.
At least two of those four are required to reach the 163-seat parliamentary magic number.
Late on Thursday, Allawi received the support of a key Shiite party when its leader pledged it would not join a coalition that did not include Iraqiya.
"It (Iraqiya) received many votes in the western regions and in Baghdad, and it is not right to ignore the will of these people, because excluding Iraqiya means excluding these people," Ammar al-Hakim said in comments posted on the Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council (SIIC) website.
Iraqiya secured 91 seats in the 325-member Council of Representatives, with much of its support coming from secular Shiite Muslims in the south and Sunni Arabs in the north.
It won two seats more than State of Law, while the INA, of which SIIC is a member, secured 70 seats.
Though the SIIC controls less than a third of the INA's seats, it remains popular among Shiite Muslims in the south and its support for Iraqiya could prove crucial in building a parliamentary majority.
States rights must be supported. That is the heart of federalism.
California is going to pass a law legalizing possession of small quantities of marijuana, for personal use. This will boost state revenue, and lead to a more mellow work force. Sales of junk food will go through the roof, providing employment for thousands.
Then, the Rastifarian Church, a Jamaican-based Christian church, that uses marijuana as a "holy herb" in it's liturgy, can grow quickly, Maan.
Nothing like Federal control to protect us from vices, hey, Stone Philip? Like drinking or smoking.. hey, wait.. they ALLOW those. Maybe they will allow other vices, if given the sole power to do so, too? Given this example, maybe your idea they will "protect" us may not work, in the end. But, the central concern really is.. do we all want more and more government control over our lives in the name of "helping" us to make the right choices?
Is it really the American way.. more and more government control?
By allowing less freedom and getting more and more control by the Feds.. with someone else telling you what you should and should not do, we will end up with a nanny state controlling everything. That is the slippery slope we are on with denial of states rights, in the big picture.
It isn't that the "nanny state" hasn't been done before.. just not in America. The American way was to keep government small and out of our faces. There are plenty of other places which have gone this route.. why not look there for how those experiments ended up? Why don't you bring up example after example of federal governments getting into the business of their people and the blissful and wonderful repercussions of it doing so? Because there are none out there to look at, that's why. The more government controls things.. the less free the people are. Look at Cuba, Venezuela, China or Iran. Do you prefer to live in those countries where government tells its people what to do? That is the difference between the American experiment and the others in the world. America was great by keeping its government limited. As Reagan said, "Government is the problem."
He was right.
If government could solve all the problems for its people, we would see countries where that idea has worked. Russia is not exactly where most of us would move because their government solved its people's problems. And they do control a huge amount of the economy and their people's choices. So if there is more freedom (of vices) maybe the problem is that there are consumers of those vices, that there are people in America which are corrupt. If America wants less corruption, they should push their missionaries, and get people to be more religious. The religious are also by default those who are less likely to consume drugs for recreation, aren't they?
A few famous quotes on government:
H. L. Mencken:
I believe that liberty is the only genuinely valuable thing that men have invented, at least in the field of government, in a thousand years. I believe that it is better to be free than to be not free, even when the former is dangerous and the latter safe. I believe that the finest qualities of man can flourish only in free air – that progress made under the shadow of the policeman's club is false progress, and of no permanent value. I believe that any man who takes the liberty of another into his keeping is bound to become a tyrant, and that any man who yields up his liberty, in however slight the measure, is bound to become a slave.
Aesop:
We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office.
H. L. Mencken:
As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their hearts desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.
- The Baltimore Evening Sun, July 26, 1920
Hubert H. Humphrey:
It was once said that the moral test of Government is how that Government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in the shadows of life, the sick, the needy and the handicapped.
Albert Camus: By definition, a government has no conscience. Sometimes it has a policy, but nothing more.
Noam Chomsky: States are not moral agents, people are, and can impose moral standards on powerful institutions.
Albert Einstein:
The really valuable thing in the pageant of human life seems to me not the State but the creative, sentient individual, the personality; it alone creates the noble and the sublime. . .
Barry Goldwater: Those who seek absolute power, even though they seek it to do what they regard as good, are simply demanding the right to enforce their own version of heaven on earth. And let me remind you, they are the very ones who always create the most hellish tyrannies. Absolute power does corrupt, and those who seek it must be suspect and must be opposed.
Edward R. Murrow:
A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves.
Franklin D. Roosevelt:
The only sure bulwark of continuing liberty is a government strong enough to protect the interests of the people, and a people strong enough and well enough informed to maintain its sovereign control over the government.
George Jean Nathan:
Bad officials are elected by good citizens who do not vote.
Mark Twain: The government is merely a servant -- merely a temporary servant; it cannot be its prerogative to determine what is right and what is wrong, and decide who is a patriot and who isn't. Its function is to obey orders, not originate them.
Thomas Jefferson: A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor and bread it has earned -- this is the sum of good government.
Russian Media Agrees… US Moving Rapidly Towards Soviet Style Economy
Friday, April 2, 2010
Jim Hoft
“We must not revert to isolationism and unrestrained economic egotism… Excessive intervention in economic activity and blind faith in the state’s omnipotence is another possible mistake. True, the state’s increased role in times of crisis is a natural reaction to market setbacks. Instead of streamlining market mechanisms, some are tempted to expand state economic intervention to the greatest possible extent… In the 20th century, the Soviet Union made the state’s role absolute. In the long run, this made the Soviet economy totally uncompetitive. This lesson cost us dearly. I am sure nobody wants to see it repeated.”
- Russian Prime Minister Vladamir Putin
Opening ceremony of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland
January 28, 2009
This was really pathetic.
Even Russian President Vlad Putin warned the US about socialism last year:
Too bad the Democrats wouldn’t listen… Or, maybe they listened but just didn’t care.
Whatever the reason, the Russian News Service RIA Novosti still thinks America is transforming into a Soviet style economy, via Big Government.
Quote:
U.S. President Barack Obama has finally brought America closer to European universal healthcare systems. It took him almost a year to persuade Congress to approve his healthcare reform. The House approved it by a majority of only seven votes (219 to 212) on March 21. The amended bill will be submitted to the Senate but this will be a sheer formality, since the Senate is dominated by Democrats and the endorsement procedure has already been agreed upon.
The 44th U.S. president could sign the bill this week. He will then go down in history not only as the first black president, but also as the first “red” president: Obama’s Republican opponents maintain that the bill is too socialist.
The European genes implanted into the American medical insurance system will not make it similar to that of Britain, Sweden or even neighboring Canada. Even Obama could not dare to be so radically socialist. However, his reform is truly historic, albeit only for America.
Europeans may mock it as pathetic since they adopted medical insurance systems decades ago. Russia also has such a system. Indicatively, one of the most vicious opponents of Obama’s reform, Republican Devin Nunes, accused the bill of continuing the failed Soviet experiment. He was overly emotional but there is a grain of truth in what he said.
===
Even Russia continues to mock the nation’s leaders for their failed economic policies. (url given)
How’s that for hope and change?
Comments:
1) jonyjoe101
The communists accusing us of being “too communist”. Even Hugo Chavez said to Castro that Obama makes them look they are too far to the right side of the political spectrum.
They trained Obama very good at Harvard, the best schooling that foreign money can buy.
2) JR
It’s recently dawned on me that some of us were alive and aware during the period the Berlin Wall was in place. Our parents could point to the Wall, and to the totalitarian government behind it, as symbols of evil. People craved freedom so much they risked their lives for it. We understood this – it was plain to see. We appreciated freedom.
To the youngsters nowadays, totalitarianism has no evil connotation. There is no clear example of evil, like the Wall. The siren call of the nanny state is alluring to many. The youngsters are, in fact, voting for it, not realizing it’s a one way street, and that freedoms lost may never be regained.
3) jonasay
JR your point rings home to me. My Grandma escaped Hitler’s Germany with her family and came to the United States as an early teen. The last moment I had with my Grandma was watching the fall of the Berlin Wall and describing what was happening as she could no longer see the television. Her voice got real strong for a moment and said, “I’m ecstatic for them for terrified for us.” I stood there puzzled and said nothing. I was a freshman in college and didn’t understand the context of what she was saying. After a few moments, she said it again adding, now you don’t know who your enemy is, and thus your enemy will come from within. I just thought it was impossible. Marxism is a proven failed ideology. How many more examples we do we need that Marxism will yield utter destruction upon society?
Combining my study of economics to my recent study of history keeps me coming back to the Kondratieff Wave Cycle. What is it with the fallibility of the human ego to keep falling for government solutions and government utopia every 80 years? 1930 + 80 = 2010. 1930 Progressive Movement; 2010 Progressive Movement.
FDR Progressive = Great Depression. Obama Progressive = ?? – History has proven over and over again, that Obama’s ideals are nothing new and yet will destroy the United States, and yet we do nothing.
The power must be drained from Washington. I am all for succession. The Marxists can live together and the Capitalists can live together with each group having no influence over the other. That is the only peaceful solution, I see if we continue on this path.
4) Finncrisp
Barry is no longer hiding his core beliefs. He is certain he has taken America far enough that the momentum cannot be stopped. It is now up to us to climb back up that cliff we have fallen over and take America back from over the brink.
5) bg
++
the irony is, it’s been noted how Russia and China are transitioning towards Capitalism..
many article’s can be found here (url) or here (url), & depending on what one google’s, elsewhere.. (url)
Obama’s Approval Sinks to 44% After Health Care Stunt
Friday, April 2, 2010, 8:43 AM
Jim Hoft
Yep, America LOVES ObamaCare.
Obama’s approval rating dropped 5 points in one month after signing the democrat’s health care legislation.
CBS reported:
Last week, President Obama signed historic health care reform legislation into law — but his legislative success doesn’t seem to have helped his image with the American public.
The latest CBS News Poll, conducted between March 29 and April 1, found Americans unhappier than ever with Mr. Obama’s handling of health care – and still worried about the state of the economy.
President Obama’s overall job approval rating has fallen to an all-time low of 44 percent, down five points from late March, just before the health bill’s passage in the House of Representatives. It’s down 24 points since his all-time high last April. Forty-one percent of those polled said they disapproved of the president’s performance.
===end quote===
And, 54% of Americans favor repeal of the dem’s health care bill. (url)
Sara: "As Reagan said, "Government is the problem." Reagan didn't believe that. He increased the size of government. More hot air from Reagan, the Republican Liar in Chief.
Besides, the problem is really, allowing women to vote. If you look at voting stats, Republicans would win nearly every election if women were not allowed to vote. Women always whine and want more and more from government. Typical female behaviour: find someone else to pay your bills. Some times it's called marriage. If that doesn't work, women look to Daddy Government.
Sara said: "H. L. Mencken:
As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their hearts desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.
- The Baltimore Evening Sun, July 26, 1920"
Hi BritishKnite,
The info for the courier companies not to bring in curency of any kind was on the Warka site that also tells us what deals ISX comps are giveing, the info is from Mr I, keep the site in your favs so you can see if any comp is doing a deal, http://www.warka-bank.com/inner.php?type=3&id=74 check in on the site so you never miss a deal on the ISX
Its just courier comps that they are stoping, so just send in a small padded packet X qty of the big denoms through the standard postal service, this is why Im sure Warka are just saying if it gets lost tough titty
I have in the post wired funds via the Dresdner bank in Germany and forgot to put my Warka account number on it, oopps so I have just sent an Email to Mr I giveing all the details and he has found them the three times I did it, I blame it on my bank HSBC as they did not tell me that the Warka account number is binned after each transfer of funds.
Selling on Ebay dont forget the final selling fees have gone up a lot so selling at a loss to the Halifax should be no bigge as when you have wired funds to your Warka account then move them into your IQD account you are getting the CBIs exchange rate so you willmore than make up for what you lost exchanging them in a UK bank
Have a nice day and stay lucky as dell boy would say, Steve.
Or if you have big denoms take them to your high street branch of the Halifax they will take them for you if you have an account with them, although you buy from them without an account, but I get better deals from the Middle East on the big denoms, so I have not got any from the Halifax for a few years now
Dinnar sales on Ebay are slow and mostly for small amounts of dinars in the small denoms
There has been a few people trying to sell because they got cold feet from some of the dinar chat sites telling doom and gloom so they have been running around like headless chickins, Kin wallys they believe what these numptys are telling them, they buy a few dinars then sit on some brain dead chat site waiting to be spoon fed info and the sad part is they believe what ever the wallys tell them, they are good for a laugh but thats about it
A guy called Adam Montana started a site and said I am not a dinar dealer or a pumper and i dont drink kol ade (whatever that is) so then he has endless nerds reading his crap and he duz say he has an in at the CBI yea right and I got a bridge for sale in London, then he starts to sell his dinar info book, dinar for dummies, I had been waiting for him to start selling something, con man, and he flys out to the Middle East for talks with his CBI insider and he is talking about a better exchange rate for all his wallys, sounds just like that other WA%%%R SFMedic same sort of crap
Takeing them to your bank and changing them is the same as if you had a load of $US dollars your not going to be taxed on them, dinars you would only be taxed on the profit you made, but then whos to know how much you paid for them in the first place
I am keeping a good few million in cash here in the UK
I will take your word for it I shouldn't have quoted the fellow in general about an idiot ending up in the WH.
He likely is anarchist, or something.
To make up for it, here are a few more from Reagan I like:
===
If a bureaucrat had been writing the Ten Commandments, a simple rock slab would not have had nearly enough room. Those simple rules would have read, “Thou Shalt Not, unless you feel strongly to the contrary, or for the following stated exceptions (See Paragraphs 1-10, Subsection A).”
The kind of government that is strong enough to give you everything you need is also strong enough to take away everything that you have.
Government is not the solution to our problems. Government is the problem.
If government subsidized beaches, we would have a shortage of sand.
Politics is supposed to be the second-oldest profession. I have come to realize that it bears a very close resemblance to the first.
Government is like a baby: an alimentary canal with a big appetite at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other.
===
Reagan did say and believe that Government is the problem. It was in his first inaugural address, found here:
Ronald Reagan addresses the nation at his First Inaugural Address.
Collections - Ronald Reagan, First Inaugural Address
Quote:
"Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem."
Sara said: "I will take your word for it I shouldn't have quoted the fellow in general about an idiot ending up in the WH.
He likely is anarchist, or something."....actually, Mencken thought Christians like you are idiots. He was no anarchist.
Women have the vote and there is no turning back. Women outlive men, vote more often, and vote more left wing than men. Women elect most Presidents, despite all the bullshit feminists will feed the public about women being helpless. Always have voted more left wing. The only exception is if they feel threatened, like after 9-11, they will vote for a male authoritive right wing figure. Even dummy Bush figured out he had to cater to women with his "compassionate conservatism"...So all this so-called socialism over running America has nothing to do with a particular philosophy winning. Women knew Obama wanted to bring it health care for everyone, and they knew it would be costly, adn men would pay. That's why they voted him in. If you want to call it socialism, fine, that's not my term, but then socialism was voted in by American women, it wasn't imposed on anyone.
So all your nonsense about socialism invading, when it's just a gender issue, and dummy Republicans can't even figure this out. Women vote in left wing candidates. Period. And it's here to stay, and is part of the reason the Republicans may be out of office for a long time. Then, Obama will open up immigration, and immigrants are more likely to vote Democrats. Also, minorities in America are growing faster than the majority, and minorities vote Democrat. And in his second term, Obama will legalize Mexicans, who usually vote Democrat. Meanwhile, the dumb Republicans don't have a clue they are being handed their walking papers, and completely out foxed by Obama at every turn. The leadership of the Republican Party are a bunch of turnips.
The basic problem with the Republicans is their leaders are idiots, and deserve to lose, with vegetables like Sara Palin, who should have stuck with being a small town mayor, or a retired beauty queen. If you weren't embarressed that she was the Republican candidate for VP, you have a problem.
Maybe in 25 years, the brighter Republicans will start to figure this out.
Iraqi government is harassing winning candidates, Sunnis say
By Leila Fadel
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, April 2, 2010
BAGHDAD -- In a sign of hardening sectarian divisions, the secular, largely Sunni-backed bloc that won the most seats in Iraq's recent parliamentary elections says its victorious candidates are being subjected to a campaign of detention and intimidation by the government of Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.
Maliki's State of Law coalition lost by two seats to Ayad Allawi's Iraqiya bloc; the prime minister has been contesting the results of the March 7 vote, saying they are fraudulent. State of Law has appealed the outcome in Iraq's courts and now, Allawi's bloc says, Maliki is using state security forces in a bid to gain enough seats to emerge the winner.
This week, at least two winning Iraqiya candidates in the capital were told they are wanted, bloc officials and the candidates said. Two others are on the run in the mixed Sunni-Shiite province of Diyala, and another was detained before the elections.
Sunni Arabs see the win by Allawi, a secular Shiite, as their own. Many Iraqis and analysts worry that Sunnis will feel cheated if Allawi loses his lead before the new parliament is certified, a development that could spark retaliatory violence just as U.S. troops are drawing down to a mandated 50,000 by summer's end.
One security forces commander confirmed that orders to carry out such detentions must have approval from the highest level of government and said he worries that he is being used for political ends. The commander, who spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to speak freely, said he was told last week to arrest a winning candidate from Allawi's list on charges of terrorism -- charges he said he knew were unfair.
"I'm in a situation that no one would envy," he said. "I'm wondering why didn't they arrest him and try to detain him before."
In the southern Baghdad district of Madain, Qais al-Jubouri, who won a seat March 7, left his home late Monday night after receiving a summons to go to the local Iraqi commander's office. Jubouri, a tribal sheik who had helped form a Sunni Arab paramilitary group at the U.S. behest to battle the insurgency, knew it was not good news.
For more than three years, he had worked with the Iraqi and U.S. militaries and the Iraqi government to foster reconciliation between Sunni Arabs and Shiite Arabs in volatile Madain. Now he faces an arrest warrant on terrorism charges in a case that was solved years ago, military officials and Jubouri said. On Tuesday, he said, his house was raided and his sons were photographed. He is afraid to return home.
"They are tracking us because we won," Jubouri said Wednesday. "I wonder why now I'm wanted by the law. My tribe, my cousins and I saved the law in my area."
Kadhim al-Attiyah, another winning Iraqiya candidate in the capital, is also on the run. This week, military officers told him to leave his home in southern Baghdad. He asked if the government had something against him. He recalled that the officers answered cryptically, "Sure, something is coming."
"We will be chased as long as power is in the hand of a person who belongs to another bloc," Attiyah said Wednesday. "We will not feel safe until the new government is formed and the parliament members are sworn in."
A losing Iraqiya candidate, Naheth Ibrahim Ahmed, was detained Wednesday in Yousifiya, on Baghdad's southern outskirts.
A spokesman for the Defense Ministry denied that military officers are carrying out politically motivated warrants.
Special correspondent Jinan Hussein contributed to this report.
In case any of you are at all curious about those "Christian" and "militia" members who were arrested..
Here are two articles.. This first one says one of them is a registered DEMOCRAT..
(the affiliation of the others could not be determined) the next, shows one is ANTI-BUSH.
So much for the "right wing" accusations, hey?
===
Most indicted members of militia group are voters
By TOM TROY
BLADE POLITICS WRITER
April 01, 2010
Most of the indicted militia members accused of being anti-government extremists have active voting records, a check with area voter registration offices showed yesterday.
One is a registered Democrat, and the party affiliations of the rest could not be determined.
Jacob J. Ward, 33, of Huron, Ohio, voted as a Democrat in the 2004 and 2008 primary elections. He also voted in 10 other elections since 2000. Party affiliation in Ohio is determined by which party's ballot they requested in the most recent primary election.
AND, as I said, there is a video (I did not click on it), showing that a member of that militia was flagrantly and angrily ANTI-BUSH, so again, not Republican.
===
Video - Militia Plotter Was Anti-Bush
Video via Rebecca on Twitter - to TPM. Video link below -
Accused Militia Plotter Bared Almost All In Film (VIDEO)
But Sickles, who in those videos identified himself as a member of the Ohio Militia, may also have a lighter side. The accused plotter looks to have starred in a deeply Not Safe For Work movie, filled with cursing, mock violence, pot jokes, and sound effects conveying flatulence. Sickles appears entirely naked but for a mask of President George W. Bush that obscures some, but not all, of his genitalia.
Perhaps there are some that have some interest of getting in on more IQD's traight from your computer at home, once it hits Forex.
The advantage is that you can buy Dinars with quite a bit of leverage, meaning if you have leverage for example 100:1, you can get 100 Dollars worth of Dinars and cover the purchase with 1 Dollar.
The currency market swings very much but the actual movement is very very small, so small in fact that currency is traded with four decimals.(each increment is called a Pip) That makes the trades comparable very safe for the broker and he will (if he is a market maker) always take the opposite side of the trade.
If he is a non dealer desk broker, he will go directly to the market.
(Brokers make money out of a spread, meaning there is always a difference in buy and sell price, usually a couple of pips, that is how the broker get his cut)
There is a lot to it when it comes to how Forex works and this is not really a forum for Forex education, but the reason I am venting this is to highlight that there is a splendid opportunity for each and everyone of you to do a purchase from your home, straight on your computer, via a Forex broker.
It is not hard at all to open up an account, some brokers let you start with an account that is very small a couple of hundred bucks only. ( some with as litle as 5 bucks....but that is more like a ploy, you really can't do much with that little)
To get started, all you have to do is to go to a brokers website, download a trade platform, and they are most willing to let you have a "demo account".
That is an account with no real money, just a Monopoly money account.
You will however trade against the real market with that account, and the whole purpose is to get you to be familiarized with the trading platform, and learn the basics of trading before you put anything on the line.
There is a lot of pitfalls in Forex, as with any other market, and it might be a very good idea to practice a bit first.
In this way you could all go and get Dinars straight from your computer back home, and the good thing in it is, whatever the currency you are trading with, the end result will always be Yankee Dollars in an account here in the US.
I am just saying this to you all to highlight another angle, because you will not have any currency import problems, no bank exchange problems, no wiring of currency no nothing, it is just appearing on the screen as a curve ( most common is a candlestick curve).
One of the most peculiar phenomenon in Forex is that there is no good or bad curve, because if it goes up, you buy and if it goes down, you sell, and can do as good (or bad) in an uptrend as with a downtrend.
If you do have some interest in this, please watch it, the market is unregulated, and there is a lot of "aftermarket hype". People that want to sell you computer programs that will make you rich, and people that have the secret settings to those programs (for 89.99) , and a lot of jazz.
You can pretty much recognize the clowns with a couple of keywords, it's either, the "secret revealed" or the "truth revealed" or the "truth that the brokers don't want you to know" or shit like that.
Usually the bigger brokers have an education site where you can learn the basics. Remember , all the useable knowledge in Forex is out there for free, no need to pay anyone for his "secret".
A couple of sites I recommend for the beginner would be Babypips, and ForexFactory....start with Babypips first (and make sure you graduate also) , there is a lot of links as you go.
If and when the Iraqi Dinar hits the market, you will in that case be in a very good position yourself, to ride the Forex wave also.
It goes up, you buy, and make money, it goes down, you sell , and make money.
Again the market itself is very big, and if you have the disciplin to trade with the market the whole time, you can be very hansomely rewarded, but if you treat the Forex like a Las Vegas style enterprise you will be burned.
We don't know when Mr Shibibi,s promise will come true, and he will release the Dinar on the Forex, but in the meanwhile, anyone that can se the opportunity would probably se the better of it, and prepare him/herself now, so when it actually hits, you can be at cause over it.
I can not recommend any broker, it has to be up to you, all I can say, choose big brokers that have been around the block a couple of times.
Once you get to that point, you can go to TraderschoiceFX , they are a "prebroker" and will set you up with the bigger guys.
Just another way of getting in on the Dinar wave once it is released, you...however have to be a bit prepared if you want to ride the Forex wave.
If you're really really in a hurry to get going, then do it this way.
Go to TraderschoiceFX, look for Demo accounts, you will have a couple of choices of big brokers, situated either here or in the UK.
Pick one, and click on demo account for that broker.
Download a free trade platform called MetaTrader 4.
Start playing around with it, and at the same time, go to Babypips. com, and put yourself in school.
They take you through Kindergarden to College free of charge.
Good luck, and if you want to play the Dinar Forex game then I hope you are prepared the day Dinar hit the Forex.
Division among Iraq’s Shias good news for Allawi
(AP)
3 April 2010
BAGHDAD — When the coalition led by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki narrowly lost at the polls, he raised the prospect that he could pull ahead by gaining the support of other Shia-dominated alliances. Since then the largest of those groups have been reaching out — but not to him.
Al-Maliki’s secular challenger, Ayad Allawi, gained a significant advantage when he won the unexpected support of a major Iranian-linked Shia party. That came after anti-American Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr made a move widely seen as ominous for al-Maliki: asking his followers to decide which candidate his movement should support in a two-day, unofficial referendum that began Friday.
Those developments may be only the beginning of a flurry of dealmaking that will determine the leader of Iraq’s new government, but they highlight al-Maliki’s struggles to overcome his personal unpopularity among rival Shia leaders.
The leading contenders in the March 7 election each failed to score a decisive win, which left them scrambling to get enough parliamentary support to form a government. Allawi’s cross-sectarian bloc tapped into heavy Sunni support to come in just two seats ahead of al-Maliki’s mainly Shiite list, 91-89; 163 seats are needed to rule.
Allawi appeared to be benefiting from stark divisions in the Shia community despite purported efforts by neighboring Iran to push al-Maliki and his rivals into a coalition that could cement Shiite domination of the government.
Ammar al-Hakim, the leader of the Supreme Council, did not endorse anybody as prime minister but said he was open to an alliance with Allawi’s Iraqiya list.
“We will not participate in the next government if Allawi’s list is not in it,” al-Hakim said in remarks broadcast late Thursday on his party’s TV station.
Retired Army Lt. Col. Nathan Freier, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, called it a move that could sideline al-Maliki while shoring up al-Hakim’s power base in the Shia south.
“They see this as a route to weaken Maliki in a way to reassert their prominence in areas of Iraq that they consider the most important to them,” he said. “This is a way for them to nullify Maliki and play for time.”
Al-Sadr’s polling could give the Sadrist leadership an excuse not to support al-Maliki and openly back another candidate following the people’s wishes.
Al-Sadr supporters set up polling tents across the capital and other predominantly Shia cities, drawing hundreds of people, some of them fingering prayer beads and holding umbrellas to shield them from the sun. Organizers expected to release results Sunday.
“It is a good idea to let the Iraqi people choose the next prime minister,” said Samir Abbas, 35, who owns a food shop in eastern Baghdad’s Sadr City, when asked why he was joining the poll less than a month after official elections.
Allawi’s American ties could pose a challenge with the Sadrists — but they are also virulently opposed to al-Maliki because he unleashed U.S.-Iraqi offensives against their militias and jailed their followers.
Al-Sadr and the Supreme Council are united under a Shia religious umbrella known as the Iraqi National Alliance, which came in third place. But SIIC and its sister Badr Organization only received 21 of the 325 parliament seats, while al-Sadr’s movement got 39, putting him in a kingmaker position along with some Kurdish parties.
Al-Hakim did not specifically back Allawi as prime minister but called him a “friend and partner in the political process.” In a significant gesture, al-Hakim also rejected allegations that Allawi’s list had ties to Saddam Hussein’s Sunni-dominated Baath party, an issue that has stoked sectarian tensions during political maneuvering before and after the elections.
Negotiations for a new government are expected to take months and it is unclear what impact the Supreme Council will have on the final outcome after its poor showing in the election.
Allawi’s group, which consists of both Sunnis and Shia, has reached out to all sides.
“Absolutely we welcome the support, which will help build an authentic government,” Allawi spokesman Abdul Rahman al-Bayder said. He added that the party is “ready for a coalition that serves the political process and democracy.”
Stoned (well named) wrote, "the dumb Republicans don't have a clue they are being handed their walking papers, and completely out foxed by Obama at every turn. The leadership of the Republican Party are a bunch of turnips. The basic problem with the Republicans is their leaders are idiots.. Maybe in 25 years, the brighter Republicans will start to figure this out."
The reality?
===
GOP wins 'favorite party' poll in Nov. omen
By GEOFF EARLE
April 2, 2010
WASHINGTON -- Republicans have passed Democrats on a generic ballot test in a year when control of Congress is up for grabs -- the latest indicator of what could be a tumultuous November.
Voters say they plan to pick the Republican over the Democrat in their congressional district by 47 to 44 percent, according to the latest Gallup Poll.
The results were a reversal from early March -- before the dramatic enactment of health-care legislation -- when Democrats led by the same margin, and could indicate Democrats in Congress are paying a price for their support of the new law.
Such an advantage is rare in the poll's 60-year history, according to Gallup. It happened only a few times, in 1950, 1994 and 2002 -- all of them years when Republicans ran well in midterm elections.
The electorate is also getting fired up, with 62 percent now saying they are "more enthusiastic about voting than usual," up from 47 percent in February.
Trust on Issues 53% Now Trust Republicans More Than Democrats on Health Care
Saturday, April 03, 2010
Voters now trust Republicans more than Democrats on nine out of 10 key issues regularly tracked by Rasmussen Reports.
Following the passage of the health care bill, 53% now say they trust Republicans on the issue of health care. Thirty-seven percent (37%) place their trust in Democrats. A month earlier, the two parties were essentially even on the health care issue.
These results are consistent with the finding that 54% of voters want the health care bill repealed. Rasmussen Reports is tracking support for repeal on a weekly basis. Health care ranks number five among voters on the list of 10 important issues. The economy remains the top issue of voter concern as it has been for over years.
On the economy, Republicans are trusted more by 49% while Democrats are preferred by 37%. That’s a big improvement for the GOP following a five-point advantage last month. More voters who make under $20,000 annually trust Democrats on this issue, but voters who earn more than that favor Republicans.
When it comes to government ethics and corruption, 35% trust Democrats, 33% trust Republicans, and 33% are not sure. Most unaffiliated voters don’t trust either of the major parties on this issue.
Republicans also have double digit advantages on taxes, national security, immigration, abortion.
Confidence that America is winning the war on terror is down slightly this month, and belief that the United States is safer today than it was before 9/11 has hit its lowest level ever.
Sixty-six percent (66%) of voters expect Washington to grow more partisan over the next year, which is just one point below the highest level measured since regular tracking of the question began in January 2009.
About that Rasmussen poll, quote, "belief that the United States is safer today than it was before 9/11 has hit its lowest level ever,
Well, you just have to love these lyrics:
You picked a fine time to lead us, Barack,
Abandon our mission of freein' Iraq
Not sure on Afghanis
Won't bomb the Iranis 'Til the US gets blown off the map
Fellow Pothead Beats Anderson Cooper on Celebrity Jeopardy:
"I'll take Retarded Conservatives for $1000 Alex"
Anderson Cooper thought he’d have it easy going up against famous pothead Cheech Marin on celebrity Jeopardy last night because Cheech has slow reflexes being a big pothead, right? Oh, Andy, Up in Smoke, it's a movie, you fool. Cheech’s knowledge of showbiz trivia is only surpassed by his lightning quick reflexes on the buzzer. He cleaned the floor with both Anderson and actress Aisha Tyler, winning $50,000 for his charity The Hispanic Scholarship Fund. Meanwhile, Anderson’s friends are mocking him, as they should. (On a somewhat unrelated note, it’s funny how people from the east coast say “tornament”.)
This should be very good for Iraq and the strength of the Dinar..
===
China writes off 80% of its debts on Iraq
01/04/2010
Baghdad (NINA) – Iraq and China signed in Beijing an agreement by which its debts to Chinese firms are reduced by 80%.
A statement issued on Thursday, Apr. 1, by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that Finance Undersecretary, Fadhil Nabi, represented the Iraqi government in signing the agreement with Chinese officials.
According to the agreement, China wrote off 80% of Chinese companies’ debts on Iraq; this came in response to the Memo of Understanding signed during President Jalal Talabani’s visit to China on June 2007.
There is no difference between the Repubs and the Dems they both are the same: corrupt and morally weak. They both follow the same fiscal, monetary, and foreign policy. Both parties have brought this country to the brink of destruction. The AmeriKan people are the slaves of both Dems and Repubs.
I was asked who I thought is getting it right. Well, I will qualify the following statement by saying no one is perfect so no one is getting it right all the time. With that said to answer your question I have to think China is the country getting it right. Yes, I said China. The traditionally communist country like Japan are creditor nations while the U.S., England, and the European Union are debtor nations.
We see the U.S. restricting the rights of this citizenry with the Patriot Act (both Dems and Repubs voted to renew). Under King George W. Bush and now the court jester Barack Obama has sheddred the 4th amemendment and habeous corpus. The freedom and democracy you speak of for Iraq is non-existent. While the west is tightening its control of its citizenry China is actually loosening its control. There are three seperate indexes for the Chinese people to invest in. Next, they are encouraging their citizenry to invest in both gold and silver and making those commodities available. As I mentioned, China is a creditor nation they currently have 1.3 trillion dollars in reserve while the U.S. is 50 trillion dollars in debt (counting budgeted items and non budgeted items like social security, medicare, and medicade).
The U.S. paper dollar is a seriously flawed currency as the Fed continues print with nothing to back it. In contrast, the Yuan is a stable currency as China continues to buy multiple metric tons of gold. The USD will loose its reserve status and in its place will be the Yuan. Whether you like it or not or whether you believe the 21st century will see the decline of the United States and the rise of China; this is why I suggested to you sometime ago to learn Mandarin. China is the next superpower and its billion people will be the largest consumers in the world. China China China remember China.
So China is the one that got it right. Their currency is great and our currency is down the drain.
Not really.......
China is cheating with almost anything they can get away with, and are continously doing so, with their currency, with copyrights and with their human rights.
China is up on occasion for their offical state of the union or state of their currency, to show for the world how they are doing.
China is a carhouse ready to implode, if you are truly worried about the US economy, you would be shit scared to the point of terror, of the Chinese economy.
The wild an in many occasion completely unregulated bank system alows finacing of pretty dubious enterprises, big skyscrapers or financing of doubtful enterprises. The banks are provincial banks that are tied in one way or the other straight to the state.
HongKong still have a certain amount of real economic freedom, but despite the, for the eyes, big expansion, in China it is built on unrepayable loans given by the Chinese state bureaucracy.
If you have any kind of interest in this Rob N, I urge you to yourself study the subject.
We have experienced lately a bubble that burst, with housing and loans, China have gone through numerous bubbles like that, but have washed their books.
A whole line of banks with a lot of unpaid loans, and a social debt like nothing you have seen before, so, as there is no independent Federal bank or an independent Central Bank , they have a face to it, it is a government controlled bank, no independency, but they still call it the Central Bank.
Fox watching the chicken coupe.
So instead of, as in a free economy, letting it be transparent, and letting the loanbubble burst, new financial institutions was created, that bought up the existing debts for the face value, and voala...suddenly the bank system is in good health.
We would probably be seeing daily walks in front of the TV camera of bankdirectors going to jail one by one, would it happen here, but over there it is a matter of looking good on the books.
Here, or in the rest of the world, we call this ...cooking the books, and it is highly punishable.
Don't forget one second what we have here, we have a communist regime, that is still in charge, and the ultimate purpose is in one way or the other for them to stay in power.
The free enterprice, is only free to a point, and the basic fundamental principles of how this country is run, is layed down by the communist regime. That way is the way....or else.
The ammount of executions in China is not exactly known, but about 25000 a year is a close estimate....and it is not only criminals, that will bite the bullet.
China is not only cheating with it's books, it is also cheating it's own people of the value they are producing. An industry worker get about 20 Bucks a week in a currency that is artificially held down by the Chinese government.
The Chinese worker can not even afford the plastic stuff they are churning out from their own industries.
Nothing is free there, internet, phone and newspaper censorship is in full swing.
China is a toxic dump, and probably one of the worst polluters in the world, the toxic cloud can be traced from space, that's how big it is, very few if any regulations of cleanups, and hardly enforced.
Building permits, business permits, loans ( ultimately its a state backed loan) and such are all approved or disapproved by an underpayed state employee, that is expected to get some "favors" if the request will turn out positive.
The "worthless" Dollar of yours is horded by the Chinese, as a guarantee for their currency. ( who is the biggest fool, the fool or the one following the fool), the Dollar amount that is stacked, does represent basically Dollars that are taken out of the circulation, or if it is reinvested, it is mainly back to the US market. So the real Monopoly money is the Chinese currency. Printed like crazy and borrowed to dubious project, given by a bribed stateworker, and the wheels are spinning endlessly in that track.
Abandoned projects are pretty common , half built housing or industrial complexes, when they ran out of capital (read un repayable loans) the project was just walked away from.
As you can see, this will not hold up in the long run, and the peak of the Chinese scam was probably when they had their Olympics. It all looked good. China is in for some substantial problems now, and everytime another state employee is bribed, or the books are cooked, the bigger the fall it is setting itself up for.
You can push the house of cards higher and higher, but there really are no end solution to Chinas problem with the way they are trying to solve it now.(well...they're really not even trying to solve it)
Eventually the billion or so Chineese will demand a cut of the cake, and when it can't be had, that is probably the end of communist China as we know it.
Would the Chinese be smart, and started to circulate the Dollar, they are sitting on, within China, things would sudenly move along, then they would introduce a currency that are not controlled, and have some horsepower in it.
Most probably that will not happen, the communist China will make sure that, the Chineese will (as the Iraqis with Saddam) see, on the face of their currency, the biggest mass murderer in history.
Mao Tse Tung.
So there it is Rob N.
The Chinese sure got it right.
When that artificially built up bubble goes, it will go big, cause they are creating it bigger and bigger everyday, and there is not even a hint of trying to deflate it.
There is one thing you possible could do to help....don't buy Chinese.
China is not the example you want to parade, Chinas biggest trade partner is the US, and the glorious China you are telling us about is propped up by the mighty Dollar.
Remove this, as you say, worthless currency, the Dollar, from your China equation, and your Chinese currency Yuan will be cheaper than shit or wallpaper.
China may be a big consumer one day, currently per capita it is an abysmal consumer, and the only reason they have volume in consumer goods is the sheer number of people living there.
The individual life is compared with US standards miserable, and as long as the Chinese communist regime are in place, so will the individual living standard also be in place.
There are of course exceptions in China, an upperclass have developed, but it is a very dangerous place to be in, because they exist mainly from corrupted dealings with the state, and the state can "get" you at any time for any crime they wish to press.
The court system does not follow what we consider a given right. You are not necessarily considered innocent until proven guilty, if you are caught (innocent or guilty) you have better "confess" in order for the judge to be lenient on you, no confession and the system is against you.
Good luck if you get a lawyer, possibility of the lawyer is a law student is pretty high, and you will see him/her very very briefly.
Chinese way of execution is a shot in the neck, and the surviving family is symbolically charged with the cost for the bullet. They make a big thing about rubbing that into the surviving families face, those that was not doing a crime.
It doesn't end there, the state will sell body parts on the market from the executed prisoner, and profit from his liver, kidney, eyes or what nots.
Yes Rob N. The Chinese have really got it right.
If you are impressed by the number of 1.3 Trillion that China has in it's reserve, and believe that China is sitting on all the existing Dollars, and as a consequent of that, China have a serious leverage on the US or the rest of the free world....you are dead wrong.
On the money market all around the world, a daily trade of about 3 Trillion Dollars are taking place. TWICE that of Chinas Dollar.
If China would burn those Dollar notes, it wouldnt even make a difference, the only effect it would have, is if they would flood the market with it, it would push the Dollar down for a half of day.....after that, you need more and bigger money to affect the value of the mighty Dollar.
China is a rising nation, yes, in many respects they are, but looking at a rising star and declare all others a failure because one is rising, is faulty logic.
As we stand today, the US are producing , in exchangeable goods, TWO AND A HALF TIMES that of the total output of China.
We are the most productive country on the earth, and we are beating China to it...two and a half times, with a quarter of that manpower.
Rob N. The whole culture we are enjoying that flies the Stars and Stripe, or the Maple leaf, is unbeatable.
You seems to hate Nazism, but love Communism, strange, it's just two manifestations of Socialism.
What in the frikking hell is a Neo Con Nazi anyway?
One day when I am bored enough I will look up each word in the Dictionary, and try to puzzle it together.
Every word I hear from Rob N is bad words about the Greatest Country in the World the United States.
What I do hear from Rob N is nothing but PO! Rob N how can you say you want the US to Loss, for US to loss we will loss many US Soliders lives, as a Retired US soldier myself those words itself piss me off, you must not be a American, because I have not once heard you say any positive words about The United States from you.
It's Fine to complain its our right but your words are Treason if you were AMERICAN, and if you were I would like to meet you in person so we can have a real man to man talk and then we can see the real you but of course that would never happen and you will go on with your hot air.
Sorry folks in advice normally I just read but had to get those words out about Rob N.
Well, i guess if China goes belly up, all the crap I buy at Wal-Mart will be more expensive. This old world is ruled by guns. America has the best guns so they rule the world. Minor economic problems in America can be fixed, once someone has the guts to fix them. The Chinese don't like freedom, they like order. Without freedom, there is no imagination, and imagination and ideas are the most important things in the world. The world is created with ideas, not money. Money is not real. Money is just an idea. The big American advantage over China is ideas and freedom. America is the home of ideas. China is not. The Chinese have always stolen ideas, because they lacked the imagination to come up with new ideas. Power is everything in China. Power without imagination eventually leads to stupidity, when new problems cannot be solved, due to lack of imagination, and this is bound to fail. New problems will inevitably always arise, nothing is ever stable in this world, the borning and uninspired will not solve them, the ones with imagination will. China is good at doing, but not good at thinking and being creative. China is dependent on America telling it what to think. Chinese culture is not suited to coming up with new ideas, so they have to steal them. China came up with no religion of any value, on it's own, of any consequence. This reflects the lack of imagination in China. The history of ideas in China is a pathetic joke, of no consequence, except to a few people who want to divine the future by looking at the entrails of disembowelled chickens. That's why China stagnated for 2000 years. The Chinese do not like intellectual conflict, in a free forum, they like order, and "face". The problem is, quiet order does not yield new ideas, nor challenge old, useless ones. Mental conflict is messy, when people have different ideas, but it is necessary, to challenge thinking and create new synthesis of ideas, and allow creativitity to flow. The Chinese hate this process, which is why they are so uninspired and boring at times. Communism ran China for most of the last century. Communism is the musings of a 19th century German Jew, having a bad day at the office. Marx was a failure in life, but smart, and created a system for smart failed losers to get their revenge on life, and control the country. Chinese losers like Mao, they stole his ideas, and the rest is stupidity and mass murder. Mao was a murdering moron, his Red Book reads like it is written for kindergarten, and is full of stupid sayings, that only a half wit would believe. Such was the basis of Chinese thought for most of the last century.
And these idiots are going to challenge America?
Everyone in the world wants to be American, and are jealous of America.
Everyone watches Hollywood movies, wears American fashion. Almost all technology and innovation for the last 400 years was created in America or Europe. Nothing of any consequence was invented in China. China steals, it does not invent.
Roger said, China is a toxic dump, and probably one of the worst polluters in the world, the toxic cloud can be traced from space, that's how big it is, very few if any regulations of cleanups, and hardly enforced.
==== 6 yr old from china with 31 fingers and toes
A 6-year-old boy from China, who was born with 5 extra fingers and 6 extra toes, has undergone an operation to remove his extra digits, the Daily Mail reported. If you do the math – that’s 31 fingers and toes.
The boy has a condition known as polydactyly, in which one of a variety of genetic disorders - which can be inherited, or are new mutations - gives rise to excess digits.
The idea of NEW mutations giving rise to such gross genetic abnormalities.. makes me wonder what environmental toxins this boy and his mother were exposed to. But narry a peep on that from the MSM, of course. Like RobN, they believe that China is a wonderful country and no sense posing difficult questions which might expose how backward they are and how they often poison their own. This makes China the world record holder for this genetic mutation/abnormality, nothing to brag about or emulate.
Pictures of the boy and his digits are at the url (above).
PS I am sure that if even ONE of his relatives had extra digits, it would have made it into the news article. The conspicuous absence of that narrative is very telling.
Some say Marx actually starved his children to death because he would not work and earn a living:
Karl Marx was a poor German revolutionary/writer whose children starved to death because Marx refused to do manual labor. http://nord.twu.net/acl/marxism.html
Others say that someone came to his aid and helped him or they would have:
If Engels did not come to their aid, Marx and his family would have most likely starved to death.
1) In both the Soviet Union and Red China, the number of people who starved to death when the government confiscated their farm products (animals and grain) is estimated in the tens of millions.
2) Communism is a materialistic and militantly atheistic ideology created to justify the overthrow of Capitalism, replacing free market economics and democracy with a "dictatorship of the proletariat". Under Communism, the political system replaces the private ownership of the means of production with "collective ownership" (actually nationalization).
Twentieth century Communism was based on Karl Marx's manifesto which proposed to establishment of a "classless society." In the belief that "people cannot change", governments under the banner of Communism have caused the death of somewhere between 40 million to 260 million human lives.[1][2][3][4][5][6]
With the collapse of Soviet communism and the conversion of Chinese communism to "state run capitalism," the spiritual and ideological center of world of communism and the Marxist-Leninist tradition shifted to the United States. Several prominent American communists, rudderless without Moscow direction, formed a new organization in 1992 called the Committees of Correspondence for Democratic Socialism.
The initial organizational conference was held in Berkeley, California, July 17-19, 1992. Charlene Mitchell, a former leader of the California Communist Party, speaking at the conference said, "the collapse of socialism in Eastern Europe left the United States in a near unchallenged position of world leadership." Mitchell continued,
“ What began as a moment to take stock and ponder where to go from there has now become a very different entity. People from the Communist Party, from CrossRoads, from the Democratic Socialists of America, from NCIPA [National Committee for Independent Political Action], from Solidarity, from the Socialist Organizing Network and many others, including independent leftists and independent socialists, have come together here in Berkeley. ”
Criticizing U.S. actions in the First Gulf War, Mitchell stated,
“ progressive forces were nearly powerless in the face of an onslaught of demagogic, patriotic jingoism and yellow ribbons. This war, fought for no legitimate reason, was the crowning height of President [George H.W.] Bush's New World Order. Previously, the Soviet Union helped to provide a certain balance to rein in the crazies in this country. Now, that balance is no longer there. It is now up to us, the American people, to rein in our own crazies. The left must take a major responsibility in organizing this task. ”
How does the narrative (above) differ from the MSM view and presentation of the Iraq war and current politics? (It doesn't.) Note its origin.. the Communists - and where their policies inevitably lead.
Iraq govt criticised after Sunni village massacre
04/04
Families of those massacred in a Sunni village outside Baghdad are furious at the Iraqi government for denying a local militia the weapons to protect them.
At least 24 people, including five women, were tied up and shot in the head by attackers reported to have been disguised as American troops.
Standing by a van loaded with some of the dead, one man said: “Gunmen slaughtered my uncle, his four sons and two women.”
The village of Sufiya used to be an al-Qaeda stronghold. Many of those murdered changed the course of the war when they spurned al-Qaeda to joined US and Iraqi government forces.
A spokesman from the Iraqi Defence Ministry went to the scene of the massacre. He said 24 people were arrested after hundreds of US and Iraqi troops flooded the area.
It was not long before he became a target for the anger of a relative.
“Why did you take away the protection?” she said, referring to the disarmament of their local militia. “You should have always been by their side. They were with al-Qaeda, but have been against them for some time.”
Iraq’s intelligence service believes al-Qaeda is trying to reorganise. This was the largest attack of its kind in recent months.
China is father along than your outdated attitudes reveal. Water treatment plants, three gorges dam (bigger than our own hoover dam), and other initiatives will help transform China. The land of the dragon is where America was during the American Industrial Revolution. Your anti-propaganda about China is unwarranted. As China loosens its central planning and control and the U.S. tightens its central planning and control China may turn out to be a better democracy than Amerika.
Tony C.
Yes, I want AmeriKa to fail in its bid to dominate and occupy the middle east. Iran, Pakistan, and Yemen do not want AmeriKa is selling. Another revolution is brewing in Iraq and victory for AmeriKa in the middle east will never be accomplished. The Amerikan soldier has raped Iraqi women and looted the country of its oil and gold. In Afghanistan, our soldiers manage heroin production. The AmeriKan soldiers mission there is to export the heroin into Mexico and from Mexico finds its way into AmeriKa. Pat Tilman was killed in Afghanistan when discovering this truth; since his death his family has been very quite. It is time for AmeriKa to withdraw from the middle east and end its imperial quest.
I'm just back since a couple of weeks from a year and a half as a conractor in Iraq, and these, pillage rape and slavery activities Rob N is describing, just isn't there. I worked with the military outside the wire, and Rob N.s "truths", are laughable.
So we have looted Iraq on its oil and gold, are set up with management of heroin. Growth, sales, transport and the whole network...I'll be darn.....is it really so????
A revolution is brewing in Iraq, and ...what more was it???, ...oh yes, we( our military) are setting up Mexico as the transit base for the heroin.(Why not fly it straight in????....no lets involve Mexico here also, sounds good)
Rob N.....I have tooold you over and over, don't go too heavy on the red pill, take the blue pill.
Thanks, Roger.
I'm glad you are back.
That was a great reply/post.
I was contemplating a reply to that post...
but I just didn't quite know how to reply to it.
The blue pill, for sure.
Roger and Board;
Got a minute?
Could you read this and comment?
===
Obama Accepts a Nuclear Iran
April 3, 2010
By Greg Sheridan
US President Barack Obama has decided to abandon any serious effort to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. He is determined instead to live with a nuclear Iran, by containment and, if possible, negotiation.
This is the shifting tectonic plate in the Middle East.
This is the giant story of the past few weeks which the world has largely missed, distracted by the theatre of the absurd of Obama's contrived and mock confrontation with Israel over 1600 apartments to be built in three years' time in a Jewish suburb in East Jerusalem.
Iran is the only semi-intelligible explanation for Obama's bizarre over-reaction against the Israelis.
In the Middle East, today, Iran is the story. It is the consideration behind all other considerations.
Obama has not explicitly announced his new position and he and his cabinet secretaries still make speeches saying they will try to prevent Iran acquiring nuclear weapons. But if you look at the statements closely you see a steady weakening of resolve, a steady removal of any threat of any consequence for Iran. Similarly, if you look at the actions of the administration, the sombre conclusion is inescapable.
Given Iran's missile program, which has no conceivable military use except to carry nuclear weapons, and which can now reach Europe and in due course will have a longer range, the fundamental change in US policy has global security consequences.
It has global security consequences in other ways, as well. It profoundly undermines American strategic credibility, which is the bedrock of whatever global order this troubled planet enjoys.
The troubling realisation that the Americans have given up, or are in the process of giving up, the fight to prevent Iran going nuclear is backed by the best informed security sources in Washington, London, Jerusalem and Canberra.
The bust-up between Washington and Israel only makes sense in this context. Last week, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met Obama in the White House, and also met Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at the State Department. On both occasions, all photographers and all TV cameras were banned. This was a studied humiliation of Netanyahu and all, ostensibly, because Israel announced that in three years' time 1600 apartments would be built in a Jewish neighbourhood in East Jerusalem. Yet the 10-month moratorium on new residential building in the West Bank which Netanyahu had announced in October to effusive US praise had specifically exempted East Jerusalem.
It is inconceivable that Obama would have treated any Arab or Muslim leader with the same considered contempt that he showed to Netanyahu. I speculated last week that Obama engaged in his furious over-reaction in order to pursue personal popularity in the Muslim world, and perhaps to force Israel to make so many concessions that the Palestinians would come back to negotiations. Although these negotiations would not produce a comprehensive peace deal, at least Obama could claim the talks themselves as a victory of sorts.
I still think these were important considerations but there was a much bigger strategic purpose, as well. In 2008, Israel told Washington it was planning to strike Iran's nuclear facilities. Washington talked Jerusalem out of the move, not least by showing its own determination to stop the Iranians.
In those days, senior Americans from then-president George W. Bush down, often said that "all options are on the table" in their determination to stop Iran acquiring nukes. All options explicitly included an American military strike on Iran's nuclear facilities. When Obama spoke to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in 2008, he said he would use "all elements of American power to pressure Iran".
He won a tumultuous standing ovation by using a repetition of a key word to emphasise his determination.He said: "I will do everything in my power to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon - everything in my power to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon - everything." That was Obama's equivalent to Bush's "all options".
Obama doesn't talk anything like that any more. In his message to Iran on the Iranian new year a few weeks ago, he reiterated his determination not to meddle in Iran's internal affairs and said the nuclear matter should still be negotiated.
Clinton, in her address to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee last week, spoke only briefly about Iran, repeating a pro-forma US determination to stop it going nuclear. But there was no mention of all options, everything the US could do, or all aspects of US power. Instead, she said that while sanctions were taking a long time to work out at the UN, it was time well spent, and they would show Iran that its actions had consequences.
But the bulk of her speech was all about the Israeli-Palestinian issue.
Presidential and Secretary of State speeches on subjects like this are given a level of attention that wouldn't be out of place in the preparation of a papal encyclical. The sub-text of Obama and Clinton's recent speeches can only be that they have decided that the battle against a nuclear-armed Iran is over.
One thing they are determined to do is to stop Israel from taking its own unilateral military action to stop or retard Iran's nuclear program. Israel has taken this type of action twice before. In 1981, it destroyed Iraq's nuclear reactor at Osirak. And in 2007, it bombed into obliteration a North Korean-supplied secret nuclear reactor in Syria.
It is impossible to know with absolute certainty what Israel's intentions were, or are, for the Iranian nuclear program. But for several years the most senior US officials would agree that a nuclear-armed Iran represented an existential threat to Israel. Iran's rulers, after all, not only deny the Holocaust but have made militant anti-Americanism, confrontation with Israel and even anti-Semitism, defining ideologies of the Iranian state. Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has threatened to wipe Israel off the map. Most analysts believe that for all their extremism, the Iranian rulers are rational actors and would not actually use nuclear weapons. But this is a slender analytical thread to ask Israelis to hang their very lives on. And the danger of Iran proliferating some element of nuclear material or technology to terrorists is much more plausible.
This is where the Obama-Israel dust-up comes in. By so isolating Israel, by irresponsibly unleashing a global wave of anti-Israel sentiment, especially in nations which normally support Israel, Obama has made the possibility of Israel considering unilateral action against Iran much more unlikely. The Israelis would weigh such action very carefully. There are many pluses and minuses. By creating the impression of Israel as a besieged, isolated and reckless nation, which the wildly disproportionate reaction to the East Jerusalem apartments accomplished, Obama has made the potential cost to Israel of action against Iran much greater.
Is it fair to conclude definitively that Obama has decided to give up, except for symbolic and meaningless actions, the fight against a nuclear-armed Iran?
Obama might still change his mind - he is nothing, after all, if not flexible - but that is the inescapable conclusion of his actions so far.
He has set so many deadlines for Iran. Each of them has passed and nothing ever happens. There are never bad consequences for the US's enemies in Obama world, it seems, only for its friends.
Remember, initially, that the Obama administration wanted to wait for the Iranian election in the middle of last year before it exhausted dialogue or went down the sanctions road? Remember then the deadline was September? Remember the proposal for Iran's uranium to go to Russia for enrichment? Remember the revelation of Iran's secret nuclear facility at Qom? Remember Iran's announcement that it intended to enrich uranium up to 20 per cent, a vast leap on the technological road to weapons? Did you notice a couple of weeks ago Iran's announcement that it would build new nuclear facilities?
And where are we today? Now it is April and Obama is still talking in his feckless way about possible UN sanctions. Anything that is passed by China and Russia at the UN Security Council will be weak and ineffective. A serious US administration would have built a critical mass of like-minded countries to impose crippling sanctions on Iran outside the Security Council.
The only explanation that fits with all the facts is that the US administration is no longer serious about stopping Iran from getting nuclear weapons. James Lindsay and Ray Takeyh, writing in this month's Foreign Affairs, declare that: "If Iran's nuclear program continues to progress at its current rate, Tehran could have the nuclear material needed to build a bomb before US President Barack Obama's current term in office expires." The Foreign Affairs article, After Iran Gets the Bomb, is important in another way. It demonstrates the drift in the serious discussion in the US. It is no longer a discussion of how to stop Iran getting the bomb, but how to cope with a nuclear-armed Iran.
Here's something else you should know about Iran. US General David Petraeus, in written testimony to congress, has revealed that Iran is co-operating with al-Qa'ida in Afghanistan and Pakistan, facilitating the movement of its leaders. The Sunday Times of London recently carried interviews with Taliban leaders who were trained in Iran.
There is no chance Obama will produce a comprehensive Israeli-Palestinian peace deal in his first term in office, which is how he would like to be remembered by history. There is every chance history will remember him for something altogether different, as the American president on whose watch Iran became a nuclear-weapons state.
Greg Sheridan is the Foreign Editor of the Australian.
That article says, the danger of Iran proliferating some element of nuclear material or technology to terrorists is much more plausible.
==
Obama Lifts Scrutiny of Fliers From Muslim Nations
April 2, 2010
By Debbie Schlussel
Just over a week after Barack Obama officially hired Muslim extremist Nawar Shora to be a Senior Policy Advisor for the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), the Obama administration removed strict screening requirements for travelers to the U.S. from 14 “terrorism-prone” (translation: Muslim) countries.
If you are traveling to the U.S. from Algeria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and other assorted world paradises of the Islamic persuasion, now is your time to do Undie-Bomber, The Sequel.
The extra checkpoint scrutiny for these people has been removed, and, predictably, applauded by the usual whiner suspects from CAIR, the Muslim Public Affairs Council (whose chief honcho’s wife, Dr. Layla Al-Marayati, heads a HAMAS-enabling charity).
QUOTE:
The Obama administration is lifting an emergency order that has required extra airport screening of all passengers flying to the USA from 14 terror-prone countries, two senior administration officials said Thursday.
The emergency order was implemented after the attempted bombing of an airliner over Detroit on Christmas Day.
The new system will treat all passengers flying into the USA the same way, regardless of nationality, said the officials, who were briefed on the policy. They spoke on the condition of anonymity because the policy is not being announced until today.
===
Back to the same old failed “security” policy, which failed to catch the Undie-bomber.
QUOTE:
The policy is the Obama administration’s latest effort to tighten international aviation security since a Nigerian man, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, boarded a flight in Amsterdam allegedly carrying explosives in his underwear. Authorities said Abdulmutallab attempted to blow up the jet, which landed safely in Detroit.
===
“Tighten” security? Like eating a brick of cheese “tightens” calorie intake.
QUOTE:
In early January, the administration required foreign airports to give extra checkpoint scrutiny to anyone flying to the United States from one of 14 countries or who is a citizen of one of those countries.
Islamic groups such as the Muslim Public Affairs Council assailed the policy as profiling because most of the countries, such as Algeria, Lebanon and Saudi Arabia, are predominantly Muslim.
The policy being phased in this month will use intelligence snippets about terrorists whose full names are not known.
Authorities will put together information such as a terrorist’s partial name, facial features, recent travel history or home country. U.S.-bound passengers who match those descriptions will face extra checkpoint screening at foreign airports, according to one of the administration officials.
The system is tailored toward intelligence information and possible threats, rather than stopping people of a particular nationality, the official said.
===
Since government computer systems used for these purposes have repeatedly failed and have been shown to be boondoggles, good luck with that.
Though the Bush administration–always pandering to Muslims, as well–never had extra scrutiny for travelers from Islamic countries, it should have. And just because Obama briefly, only slightly got it for a scintilla of time–only because a Muslim’s underwear failed to detonate–doesn’t mean it’s time to get rid of these brief, necessary security measures. In fact, they were not enough because there should be extra scrutiny for Muslims coming to America from all nations, not just 14 Muslim nations.
As I always say, America . . . Desperate But Not Serious.
Since my theories are laughable concerning the mass rape of Iraqi women by American soldiers the following links should suffice: www.aztlan.net/iraqi_women_raped.html. www.democracynow.org/2005/3/29/u_s_soldiers_accused_of_raping www.cnn.com/2006/LAW/07/09/soldiers.charged/. I have other links if you are truly interested in the subject; but I am sure that regardless of the amount of evidence you will choose not to believe it.
On February 16, 2009 entitled, A Fraud Bigger than Madoff by Patrick Cockburn of the independent; the following is just first paragraph:
In what could turn out to be the greatest fraud in US history, American authorities have started to investigate the alleged role of senior military officers in the misuse of $125bn (£88bn) in a US -directed effort to reconstruct Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein. The exact sum missing may never be clear, but a report by the US Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) suggests it may exceed $50bn, making it an even bigger theft than Bernard Madoff's notorious Ponzi scheme. (www.independent.co.uk)
Radio Free Europe on 04/05/10 entitled; Russia: U.S. Aiding Afghan Drug Trade. (www.rferl.org).
According to an article by Press TV on November 01, 2009 Occupiers involved in drug trade: Afghan minister (www.presstv.ir)
Concerning Pat Tillman read, Blowback in Afghanistan The CIA Killed Pat Tillman by Kurt Nimmo (www.counterpunch.org)
I personally think that your denial of these facts is what is laughable.
That was pretty serious stuff, Obama have decided he "can live" with a nuclear armed Iran.
Kumbaja my lord.....lets hold hands together an sing....-"We are the world".
Obama has to go.
It's so frikking unbeleivable......like Chamberlain got screwed by Hitler. Peace in our time.
This Liberal....-"can't we just get along" mentality. The intruder are standing out side of the front door with an axe, ready to go, and the proposal to him is a 12 step sensitivity training session at a therapist somewhere.
It's a denial of reality, masked in a, -" we can do it.....cm'on, lets hold hands....let your aggression go......cm'on we can do it.....just close your eyes, put your fingertips together and say ooooommmmmm"... mentality.
Then the Iranian bomb goes of somewhere and all these chimpansees will be sooooo surprised, and suddenly they are all patriotic and American.
How could this happen?
How hard is it to read yesterdays newspaper????
Subjects like Pearl Harbor, 9/11, Nazi invasion of Poland, ....things just don't happens out of the blue.
Thanks for the info. I haven't started doing any trading on the ISX yet. I was hoping to be able to send my NIDs by courier to Warka, so that I could use them to trade. I'm not sure if I dare risk putting them in the normal post. It may go missing! I may just save and wire some more funds instead. I had originally wanted to get rid of my physical dinars just in case the currency changed or was re-denominated.
If you sweet talk Steve he might be able to sell it, at least tell you how you can sell it in the UK.
The idea of a zero lop has faded more and more, and as late as a couple of days ago, there was still another denial from mr Shibibi that it won't zero lop.
It was actually a real possibility there for a while, but they seem to have totally scrapped that idea.
What I am saying, with that in mind, it's not that bad of a plan to again sit on a little stash of Dinars. There are better ways to make the Dinars work for you, but it's not completely wrong to sit on them.
Are there no dealer in the UK that are buying Dinars?
I am sure that there might be ways to sell you Dinars, convert them to Pounds (or Dollar or whatever they need), and wire them to Iraq.
It was some time ago now that I held physical Dinars, but at the time I was going to send it, I had no problem at all getting a dealer to buy it out from me. There was even some banks that did exchange Dinars,(don't know if they still do or not) but I got an even better rate from the dealer than the bankquote.
I sent it FedEx to my dealer late afternoon, by early morning he had it in his hand, by lunch he had run it through his DelaRue machine, and just after lunch, he had sent my money to my bank account, and just about 20 minutes later I had it all wired to Warka. Bang, bang, bang.
After a couple of weeks I had my portfolio ( the basic set up anyway.....still tweaking it) with ISX.
Thanks, Roger. I appreciate your reply.
Four months ago I read this article which states:
Too often we have adjusted our national blinders so that we are seeing only an atomic attack upon Israel instigated by Iran. I must tell you, the likelihood of Iran arming terrorists with A-bombs is far more likely and, far and away, more dangerous to the US...
I think it is badly overlooked that the US is a real and likely target once Iran gets A- bombs, which that last article says Obama is going to allow them to obtain. I had a dream last nite, in which I saw all these little American children standing by their headstones in a graveyard. Their little faces shone like angels.. each had died in what is now a preventable nuclear attack on US soil. If you remember, that is what Osama Bin Laden has called for, the deaths of two million American children. I hope that remains only a nightmare, but I wonder.
Sara.
===
Iran Draws Ever Closer to the "Islam Bomb"
Posted in: Guest Commentary
By J. D. Longstreet
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Over the past few months, there have been a few shrugged shoulders, and a few mutters, about allowing Iran to acquire the atomic bomb rather than have a third front in the War on Terror. Granted, those shrugs and mutterings have been emanating from those with, shall we say… less “constitution,” than most? But, still, whispers of that nature tend to grow into cacophonies among, as we said, those with, uh, less constitution.
“But, J. D., doesn’t that make sense?” you may ask. “I mean, it’s only one more country in the Middle East,” you may continue.
Well, while it is true that Pakistan has the bomb, and Israel has the bomb, Iran is a whole ‘nuther story.
Pakistan is a constant worry for the US. There is little doubt that at some point, in the not too distant future, the US will have to deal with an overthrow of the current regime in Pakistan and the possibility that some, less than stable, individuals will gain control of that country’s nuclear arsenal. It’s going to happen. Bet money on it. That could be years down the road, or it could be tomorrow. The fact that we have troops next door is not a coincidence. You can bet the Pentagon has burned the midnight oil, on numerous long nights, planning, and then re-planning, how to rectify that situation… when if happens.
Israel has a nuclear arsenal. You know… the one they don’t have. Right… that one! The thing is, Israel has no plans to wipe anyone out, save for those who may attempt to do her and her people harm.
From the media we learn this: “Earlier this week, Iran state television reported that the Islamic Republic has successfully test-fired the Sejil-2 missile, whose range outstrips the Shahab, a missile said to be capable of striking Israel and U.S. bases in the Gulf. Al Alam, Iran's Arabic-language satellite television, said the Sejil missile had a longer range than the Shahab missile, which Iranian officials in the past have said can reach targets 2,000 km (1,250 miles) away, which would put Israel and U.S. bases in the Gulf within reach.” Read the entire article HERE.
Which brings us back to Iran. Iran has yet to acquire the bomb. At least… we THINK they haven’t. If not, they are certainly on the threshold of obtaining what some are calling the “Islam Bomb”.
For those “shoulder shruggers,” please consider… Iran is the instigator of much of the terror around the globe today with training, and with money, munitions, material, and in a number of cases, personnel. It is one thing for Iran, alone, to have the bomb, it is quite another for Iran to begin handing those nuclear bombs off to bands of terrorists, all over the planet, who have absolutely no qualms about setting one of them off in Berlin, Paris, Lisbon, London, or New York! And therein lies the greatest threat posed by Iran’s ownership of The Bomb.
Too often we have adjusted our national blinders so that we are seeing only an atomic attack upon Israel instigated by Iran. I must tell you, the likelihood of Iran arming terrorists with A-bombs is far more likely and, far and away, more dangerous to the US and the world.
Some of us in America understand that it will take a nuclear disaster in one of our large cities to get the attention of that portion of Americans who normally do not take part in the daily grind of everyday politics in the country and the world. They are those folks who will ask: “Now why would anyone want to bomb one of our great cities”? They are the folks who will STILL be puzzled as the mushroom cloud rears it’s dark, ugly, countenance above the ruins of what was formally a thriving metropolis with hundreds of thousand of Americans minding their own business, just like them, before the blinding flash that took their lives.
We have always had those folks with us. Historians tell us that when the 13 American Colonies girded for war against Great Britain, 1/3 were for the war for Independence, 1/3 were against the war, and 1/3 didn’t care, one way or the other.
In the days of yesteryear it was gallant, chivalrous even, to allow the opponent to get off the first shot before America took them out. Today… there will be no chance to strike back. The weapons of war are so powerful that he who gets of the first shot, most likely, will be the winner (if there is such a thing as a “winner” in a nuclear war.)
The point of my rambling is this: We have to take the reins in our teeth, dear reader, and do what must be done… before it is too late. Iran must be stopped. And the deed must be done sooner, rather than later. Americans, befuddled by all the politics in the air, both day and night for the past few years, are NOT paying attention to the gathering threat. While we are in the midst of the so-called GREAT RECESSION, Americans are, indeed, distracted. Dear reader, “distracted” is not a good thing when a country is at war for it’s very existence.
It is more likely now that Israel will attack Iran with the current Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, in charge. Netanyahu, himself a former member of the Israeli Special Forces, is acutely aware of the danger posed by Iran’s acquisition of the Islam Bomb. Remember the former government’s bungling of the war in Lebanon? Many in the IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) are still smarting from that fiasco. And, it is becoming ever more clear that the US, under the Obama Regime, cannot be counted on to stand with Israel if, when, the “War with Iran” begins. This scribe had originally thought a series of bombing raids on Iran’s nuclear facilities might be able to, at least, set back the Iranian race for the bomb a few years. Now, however, I am convinced a few air raids will not do it. It now appears, at least to this scribe, that there will be a protracted war between Iran and Israel with many casualties and, quite possibly, an exchange of missiles with major cities of both countries being destroyed in the conflagration. In other words there will be little “surgical” about it. It will be a brawl.
No, I have no idea when the strike will come, but come it will. Iran is showing all the signs that it is spoiling for a war with Israel. Israel will have no choice. Well, actually, there is a choice. Europe and America can get behind Israel and assist Israel in taking out the nuclear threat from Iran and continue to enjoy a life of freedom. Or Europe and America can allow Iran to build the bomb, disseminate it to terrorist bands around the globe, and live in fear and trembling as slaves to the Islamofacists. Those are the choices. There is NO MIDDLE GROUND… contrary to what some leading politicians would have us believe.
Now, understand. I am not “warmongering” here. What I AM trying to do is redirect the spotlight onto the very REAL, and possibly worse, threat emanating from Iran’s possession of an Atomic Bomb. And that is… again… arming terrorists with it.
America has had it rather easy, as a nation. We’ve had our wars, even amongst ourselves, but we have had periods of peace. But, I fear that is over.
I hate to break it to some of you, but the war on terror is a never-ending war. It is not likely we will ever again have a world without US troops in the Middle East. But, even if it comes to pass, that we DO manage to dampen the hostilities there, it will be only temporary. In the meantime, wars all over the globe will flare-up and US troops will be required and called into combat in diverse places. It will be a constant struggle; waged from day to day, as young Americans spill their blood in an attempt to keep the death and destruction from our shores. But, eventually, it will arrive here, in America, and we, too, will live then as Israel does today. We’ll not be able to board a municipal bus without worrying if it has a bomb affixed to it, or enter the doors of a shopping mall without the same fear, or attend a sporting event, without that same dark worry tugging at our conscious minds. It will become a way of life and we will yearn for these days of relative peace. Hardly an American family will survive without a death, or multiple deaths, of their young as a result of these wars.
Gloomy? Yes, it is, very. But as I approach my seventieth decade on this earth, I can look ahead and base this prediction on my experience of the 5 wars in my lifetime (so far) in which we have engaged the enemy and found that we have won, lost, or “tied” at the conclusion.
It is said in the Holy Scriptures that in the latter days, or “end times” as some refer to those days, “men will cry peace, peace, but there will be no peace”. Those Scriptures have proven time and time again to be right on target. I see no reason to doubt them, or their wisdom, as we stand at the threshold of a war without end.
The future is going to be difficult. But, it CAN be easier, If the Obama Regime, gets behind Israel in the coming conflict with Iran. Unfortunately, it appears to all who care to observe objectively the Obama Regime’s maneuvering in the Middle East, that the President’s sympathies tend to lie more with the Islamic faction, than with the Israeli faction and, by extension, with the American and European factions.
Tea Party is America rising up.. poll shows movement is a Bi-Partisan, Bi-Racial Movement
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Et Tu Gallup? Second Polling Org. Shows Tea Party as Bi-Partisan, Bi-Racial Movement
Monday, April 5, 2010
For the second time in two days a national poll has destroyed the image of the Tea Party movement created by the Democratic party and the mainstream media. Yesterday's poll conducted by the Winston Group, reported that the 43% of the people in the Tea Party movement are not Republicans and their major concern is jobs and the economy. This is a far cry from the nonsense progressives and the mainstream media (is that redundant?) are telling the U.S., that the Tea Parties are comprised of the extreme right racist wing of the Republican Party, organizing to find a way to destroy the presidency of the first African-American to hold the office.
Today Gallup released their own look at the Tea Party movement with a slight difference. The Winston Poll surveyed people who said they were part of the Tea Party movement, this Gallup Poll identifies people who say they support the Tea Party movement. One can assume that these audiences are very similar as the Tea Party base is 27% US in Winston and 28% in Gallup.
Gallup reports that Tea Party supporters skew right politically; but come from all political parties and demographically, they are generally representative of the public at large.
Gallup is reporting that more than half of Tea Party supporters are NOT Republican, but they tend to be much more conservative than the general population. Also, compared with average Americans, supporters are slightly more male and less likely to be lower-income. Keep in mind, that the $50,000 bracket shown as the highest income bracket below is actually the average US Household income, so it cannot be discerned whether these people are upscale, or around average.
In several other respects, however -- their age, educational background, employment status, and race (yes RACE), Tea Partiers are quite representative of the public at large. I am sure that if both the Gallup and Winston Polls are read by anyone at MSNBC their heads will explode.
America's trains, subways and buses are "vulnerable" to the kinds of horrific terror attacks that have struck London, Madrid and most recently Moscow...
And that was with conventional bombs.
Imagine how it will be when Obama lets Iran get nukes and Iran hands them off to the terrorists against the US.
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U.S. Trains, Buses 'Vulnerable' to Terror Attack, Lieberman Warns
Updated April 04, 2010
FOXNews.com
Sen. Joe Lieberman warned Sunday that America's trains, subways and buses are "vulnerable" to the kinds of horrific terror attacks that have struck London, Madrid and most recently Moscow, and said more needs to be done to protect U.S. riders.
"The threat is real to non-aviation transportation. All you've got to do is look around the world," Lieberman said, listing the numerous cities that have had their rail and bus lines bombed over the past decade. "These are targets and we know that."
Lieberman, a Connecticut independent, said the federal government is working with state and local officials to improve transportation security at places other than U.S. airports but that the work is far from finished.
"I continue to believe that ... non-aviation is the vulnerable part of our transportation system, and we frankly need to give it more than we're giving it now to protect the American people. I worry about this," he said.
Two bombs hit a cargo train Sunday in the Russian province of Dagestan. Nobody was injured in that attack, according to reports, but it followed a set of bombings in Russia that have killed more than 50 people over the past week. Two bombs on Moscow's metro killed at least 40 people Monday.
The 2004 Madrid train bombings killed 191 people. The 2005 London bus bombings killed about 50. And Mumbai's central train station was targeted, along with a number of other sites, during the terror attacks that brought the Indian city to a standstill in 2008.
Major U.S. transit systems like Washington, D.C.'s Metro and the New York subway have stepped up security in the wake of the Moscow bombings.
Imagine what the world will be like when all the attacks listed are nuclear and not conventional bombs. What will the casualty rates of terrorist bombings grow to be.. EACH?
All because America won't stand up NOW when it can be prevented.
Iraq, too, will suffer nuclear attacks.
Imagine the reports given now of attacks in Iraq and Afghanistan becoming nuclear.. how many will die.. ??
Lots of nukes... is it really a possibility?
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Agencies Suspect Iran Is Planning Atomic Sites
By DAVID E. SANGER and WILLIAM J. BROAD
Published: March 27, 2010
WASHINGTON — Six months after the revelation of a secret nuclear enrichment site in Iran, international inspectors and Western intelligence agencies say they suspect that Tehran is preparing to build more sites in defiance of United Nations demands.
The United Nations inspectors assigned to monitor Iran’s nuclear program are now searching for evidence of two such sites, prompted by recent comments by a top Iranian official that drew little attention in the West, and are looking into a mystery about the whereabouts of recently manufactured uranium enrichment equipment.
In an interview with the Iranian Student News Agency, the official, Ali Akbar Salehi, head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, said President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had ordered work to begin soon on two new plants. The plants, he said, “will be built inside mountains,” presumably to protect them from attacks.
“God willing,” Mr. Salehi was quoted as saying, “we may start the construction of two new enrichment sites” in the Iranian new year, which began March 21.
This article was based on interviews with officials of several governments and international agencies deeply involved in the hunt for additional nuclear sites in Iran, and familiar with the work of the I.A.E.A., the only organization with regular access to Iran’s known nuclear facilities. All the officials insisted on anonymity because the search involves not only satellite surveillance, but also intelligence gleaned from highly classified operations.
In any case, no new processing site would change the American estimates that it will still take Iran one to four years to obtain the capability to build a nuclear weapon. Given the complexity of building and opening new plants, it would probably take several years for the country to enrich uranium at any of the new sites.
Assessments of the potential for hidden enrichment sites beyond Qum, and the continued production of centrifuges, is one of the main subjects of an update to the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate on Iran. Drafts of the highly classified document are now being circulated inside the intelligence community, officials say, but its broader publication has been delayed.
Iran revealed the existence of the Qum plant to the I.A.E.A. last September, apparently after learning that its existence was now known to the West. Iran subsequently told inspectors that it began work on the plant in 2007 and planned to complete it by 2011, and that it would be filled with 3,000 centrifuges.
If Iran is indeed making plans to build new facilities, it would be in violation of its agreement with the I.A.E.A. In reports and interviews, inspectors have said they received no notice of new Iranian preparatory activity.
In 2003, Iran signed an agreement with the agency to turn over design information on new facilities. Iran repudiated the agreement in March 2007.
What will they do with all that nuclear bomb making material.. ?? They sure have plans to make a lot of it. You know, they do believe they are supposed to take over the world for Islam. Maybe they will not have many moral objections to nuking their way there, and this is just a part of that plan?
Would you be of the opinion, Roger and Board, that a nuclear Iran (and its hand off of nukes to terrorists around the globe) is "containable?"
If so, please say how, noting the facilities hidden in Iran's mountains and how to prevent the nuclear materials from there ending up here and being used against us.
Appeasement is a very big gamble.. do you think that there are contingency plans in case it is a wrong bet?
When do they come into effect.. after the first set of nukes go off on US soil?
What could go wrong?
And the majority thinks Healthcare a wrong decision..
They haven't really had to pay the price for that one, yet, either.
Today's article:
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Unserious About Iran Obama is acting as if he believes a nuclear Tehran is inevitable.
APRIL 5, 2010
All of these actions suggest to us that Mr. Obama has concluded that a nuclear Iran is inevitable, even if he can't or won't admit it publicly. Last year Mrs. Clinton floated the idea of expanding the U.S. nuclear umbrella to the entire Middle East if Iran does get the bomb. She quickly backtracked, but many viewed that as an Obama-ian slip.
Most of the U.S. and European foreign policy establishment has already concluded that Iran will succeed, and the current issue of Foreign Affairs makes the public case for what to do "After Iran Gets the Bomb." Authors James Lindsay and Ray Takeyh argue that a nuclear Iran is containable, and that it is better than the alternative of a pre-emptive U.S. attack on Iran's nuclear facilities.
However, even they acknowledge that a nuclear Iran "would be seen as a major diplomatic defeat for the United States," in which "friends would respond by distancing themselves from Washington [and] foes would challenge U.S. policies more aggressively." And that's the optimistic scenario.
Meanwhile, the CIA has recently reported that Iran more than tripled its stockpile of low-enriched uranium in 2009; that it has "[moved] toward self-sufficiency in the production of ballistic missiles"; and that it "continues to develop a range of capabilities that could be applied to producing nuclear weapons." A senior Western official recently told us he is confident the Iranians either have or are building secret nuclear facilities beyond the one near Qom that was disclosed last year.
It is now Mr. Obama's watch, and for a year he has behaved like a President who would rather live with a nuclear Iran than do what it takes to stop it.
I love that Beach Boy Song. How does it go? "Bomb bomb bomb, Bomb bomb Iran, bomb bomb bomb, Bomb Ira-a-an! You know you ca-a-an. You got me rockin and a reelin', bomb I-ra-a-an!"
Why use a chain saw, when a surgical scalpel will do? Spend another trillion on a war in the middle east? How dumb. Most Iranians don't even like their leaders. There are lots of resistence groups in Iran. If the C.I.A. is so stupid, they can't kill a few Iranian leaders, and figure out where the nuclear facilities are, and just bomb them, they should close up shop. Iranians would be happy if America killed their religious leaders.
Fidel Castro didn't like our President, John Kennedy, so he had the mob kill him.
Well, at least even you are not advocating sitting on your hands doing nothing at all in the face of such a serious threat. Scalpel surgery or not.. something should be DONE.. before it is too late. I wish someone had the intestinal fortitude. A nightmare of a bunch of angelic dead baby faces tells me.. no one does.
Iran is precieved as a threat because of the perpetual war we have chosen to wage in Iraq and Afghanistan. Our propaganda machine is in full force to demonize a nation we have attempted to control by the installation of a puppet regime since the 1950's. Being a sovereign nation, Iran has the right to pursue nuclear weaponry. Their pursuit of such technologies has to do with our presence in the region.
I suggest you stop propagating fear. Our imperialistic foreign policy in the region has been wrong for the last 50 years. Our presence there is serving to destablize the entire region. The answer is for us to immediately withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan and stop all military operations in Yemen and Pakistan. Bring the military home and abandon this idea of middle east domination.
Then you believe that the Iranians will give up their world domination goal of making the entire world Islamic by force if the US merely withdraws from the region? And you believe that it is the presence of the US which causes them to have a militant stand and not their being twelvers and doing this for their god? You say and think that merely because Iran is a sovereign nation it is entitled to pursue nuclear weaponry? Does that mean you condone anything they do with those weapons, including nuking you and your family? Would you have also said Hitler was entitled to develop and use nuclear weapons because he was a head of state? Or Saddam? Mao?
I disagree with your assessment that "Their pursuit of such technologies has to do with our presence in the region." I believe the Iranians would go this path of nuclear armament with or without the US being there. It is their theologic view of a manifest destiny - that they are supposed to conquer the world - which drives them. The US being there is a convenient excuse to whip up others to their cause. However, if the US were to do as you say, it would still end up the same way as it did when the US was staying out of World War II. That lack of involvement allowed Hitler to take Poland and move on... and on.. and on. It did not stop Hitler and would not in this case stop Iran. Whatever happened to "never again"??
No, Iran is a force to be reckoned with. They are like Imperial Japan with their dominion ideology under their "god" - The Emperor. The dedicated Japanese warriors would not stop until forced to do so. It took a long time until that happened and many lives were lost. It may also take a long time until this menace is ended, but it will happen. Reality won't be changed simply because you choose to believe in lies and fictions concerning Iran's intentions, anymore than it changed when Chamberlain thought by appeasing Hitler that there would be "peace in our time." Bringing the military home will not stop this War on Terror or Iran's ambitions, any more than not being involved in Europe stopped Hitler. Eventually, there will come a day when the evil of our times must be confronted and defeated.
However, I believe you and people like you are so deceived that a price in lives will have to be paid before America wakes up to her duty and does what needs to be done. For those who will pay that ultimate price, from the young to the old - who are currently walking around this day and living and loving in life - I am truly sad. Nuclear weapons truly are not to be trifled about, as we shall shortly see. (Hmmm.. "unprecedented" violence? unprecedented in the history of the world - Nukes?)
I believe this is a balanced view from the UK's telegraph news service on the twelver belief system, along with stated concerns on how it could be influencing Iran's actions and seeking of nuclear weapons:
===
'Divine mission' driving Iran's new leader
By Anton La Guardia
Jan 2006
As Iran rushes towards confrontation with the world over its nuclear programme, the question uppermost in the mind of western leaders is "What is moving its President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to such recklessness?"
Political analysts point to the fact that Iran feels strong because of high oil prices, while America has been weakened by the insurgency in Iraq.
But listen carefully to the utterances of Mr Ahmadinejad - recently described by President George W Bush as an "odd man" - and there is another dimension, a religious messianism that, some suspect, is giving the Iranian leader a dangerous sense of divine mission.
In November, the country was startled by a video showing Mr Ahmadinejad telling a cleric that he had felt the hand of God entrancing world leaders as he delivered a speech to the UN General Assembly last September.
When an aircraft crashed in Teheran last month, killing 108 people, Mr Ahmadinejad promised an investigation. But he also thanked the dead, saying: "What is important is that they have shown the way to martyrdom which we must follow."
The most remarkable aspect of Mr Ahmadinejad's piety is his devotion to the Hidden Imam, the Messiah-like figure of Shia Islam, and the president's belief that his government must prepare the country for his return.
One of the first acts of Mr Ahmadinejad's government was to donate about £10 million to the Jamkaran mosque, a popular pilgrimage site where the pious come to drop messages to the Hidden Imam into a holy well.
All streams of Islam believe in a divine saviour, known as the Mahdi, who will appear at the End of Days. A common rumour - denied by the government but widely believed - is that Mr Ahmadinejad and his cabinet have signed a "contract" pledging themselves to work for the return of the Mahdi and sent it to Jamkaran.
Iran's dominant "Twelver" sect believes this will be Mohammed ibn Hasan, regarded as the 12th Imam, or righteous descendant of the Prophet Mohammad.
He is said to have gone into "occlusion" in the ninth century, at the age of five. His return will be preceded by cosmic chaos, war and bloodshed. After a cataclysmic confrontation with evil and darkness, the Mahdi will lead the world to an era of universal peace.
This is similar to the Christian vision of the Apocalypse. Indeed, the Hidden Imam is expected to return in the company of Jesus.
Mr Ahmadinejad appears to believe that these events are close at hand and that ordinary mortals can influence the divine timetable.
The prospect of such a man obtaining nuclear weapons is worrying. The unspoken question is this: is Mr Ahmadinejad now tempting a clash with the West because he feels safe in the belief of the imminent return of the Hidden Imam? Worse, might he be trying to provoke chaos in the hope of hastening his reappearance?
The 49-year-old Mr Ahmadinejad, a former top engineering student, member of the Revolutionary Guards and mayor of Teheran, overturned Iranian politics after unexpectedly winning last June's presidential elections.
The main rift is no longer between "reformists" and "hardliners", but between the clerical establishment and Mr Ahmadinejad's brand of revolutionary populism and superstition.
Its most remarkable manifestation came with Mr Ahmadinejad's international debut, his speech to the United Nations.
World leaders had expected a conciliatory proposal to defuse the nuclear crisis after Teheran had restarted another part of its nuclear programme in August.
Instead, they heard the president speak in apocalyptic terms of Iran struggling against an evil West that sought to promote "state terrorism", impose "the logic of the dark ages" and divide the world into "light and dark countries".
The speech ended with the messianic appeal to God to "hasten the emergence of your last repository, the Promised One, that perfect and pure human being, the one that will fill this world with justice and peace".
In a video distributed by an Iranian web site in November, Mr Ahmadinejad described how one of his Iranian colleagues had claimed to have seen a glow of light around the president as he began his speech to the UN.
"I felt it myself too," Mr Ahmadinejad recounts. "I felt that all of a sudden the atmosphere changed there. And for 27-28 minutes all the leaders did not blink…It's not an exaggeration, because I was looking.
"They were astonished, as if a hand held them there and made them sit. It had opened their eyes and ears for the message of the Islamic Republic."
Western officials said the real reason for any open-eyed stares from delegates was that "they couldn't believe what they were hearing from Ahmadinejad".
Their sneaking suspicion is that Iran's president actually relishes a clash with the West in the conviction that it would rekindle the spirit of the Islamic revolution and - who knows - speed up the arrival of the Hidden Imam.
Iran's president actually relishes a clash with the West in the conviction that it would rekindle the spirit of the Islamic revolution and - who knows - speed up the arrival of the Hidden Imam.
It is this belief in speeding up the arrival of the Hidden Imam which appears to be the controlling influence in the arming of Iran with nukes, not the US presence in the region. This would happen regardless of whether the US was in the region or not. And the "hastening" or speeding up of the emergence of the "Hidden Imam" is said to be the reason for seeking actual nuclear war. This is because of the twelver belief that their Hidden Imam's return will be preceded by cosmic chaos, war, bloodshed and pestilence. And, the belief in Iran is that you can "hasten that return" by precipitating those conditions, as stated above - "might he be trying to provoke chaos in the hope of hastening his reappearance?"
Rob N, peace comes through strength. If the U.S. were a weak player, this world would be a more unstable place. If there is one top dog in a wolf pack, the other dogs get along. If the Alpha Dog gets weak, then the real fighting for supremacy kicks in, and then it gets real vicious. Your policy is foolish. You think America can be a prick? Wait till you find out what a prick other countries can be.
Thanks for that bit of knowledge. I like the idea of a mousetrap, although I'm looking at something bigger such as a bear trap! Ha ha ha! I may keep hold of the NIDs that I have a use them for immediate liquidity if/when the time comes as well as to give to close family and friends.
I will work on building up my portfolio some more thougth.
Sara, Iran is too incompetent to take over the world. You must be kidding. Germans were competent and ruthless enough to take over the whole world, they nearly did it, and it took all of the advanced countries of the world combined, to stop them. I could think of a dozen countries off hand, if they put their minds to it, could easily beat Iran in a war. Iran could be easily conquered, so your analogy with Germany and Iran being the same threat level is rubbish. It would take America 5 minutes to wipe out Iran with nuclear weapons. By conventional forces, it would take 2-3 weeks, to destroy their army, like it took for Iraq. Then, the wise thing would be, kill their top leaders that cause trouble, hold a gun to the head of the Iranian Army, but leave enough of their army in place that their army can maintain order. And then simply leave the country and say, "Bad Dog!"....Ayatolah, go sit in your corner, bad dog!!!...Don't do what Bush did, and involve yourself in a 7 year insurgency, over a shitty, useless Muslim hell hole, when the Iranian Army can maintain order. Then tell their leaders you want access to their country, for spot inspections, and if they allow terrorists to train there, you will nuke Tehran......Your military strategy sucks.
J McCain said, "the wise thing would be, kill their top leaders that cause trouble, hold a gun to the head of the Iranian Army, but leave enough of their army in place that their army can maintain order."
That, unfortunately, is not the current Administration's strategy.
Which means Iran gets nukes.
Which means they give them to their terrorist buddies.
Which means the US gets nuclear explosions on US soil.
Why don't YOU run the country, John McCain?
Why didn't John McCain get in as President?
Oh, yes, Jeb Bush gave an explanation:
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush told an interviewer that Barack Obama would not have been elected if he had been honest with Americans about his agenda. The brother of former President George W. Bush and son of former President George H.W. Bush dismissed the idea that his party's policies were unpopular with most Americans. "I don't think there's any seismic shift. The Democrats have won on tactics," he said. "Barack Obama would not have gotten elected if he'd let us in on his secret plan prior to the election," he said, pointing to the president's economic agenda and energy proposals.
Sara wrote: "J McCain said, "the wise thing would be, kill their top leaders that cause trouble, hold a gun to the head of the Iranian Army, but leave enough of their army in place that their army can maintain order."
That, unfortunately, is not the current Administration's strategy.
Which means Iran gets nukes.
Which means they give them to their terrorist buddies.
Which means the US gets nuclear explosions on US soil"
....which means, if terrorists explode nuclear bombs on U.S. soil, there will be several hundred million dead Muslims, within 24 hours...If Tehran wants to play that game, Iran will be rubble very quickly, and 98% of it's population vaporized....they know that...if they wish to play that game, they will have to deal with the consequences.
J. McCain wrote: ....which means, if terrorists explode nuclear bombs on U.S. soil, there will be several hundred million dead Muslims, within 24 hours...If Tehran wants to play that game, Iran will be rubble very quickly, and 98% of it's population vaporized....they know that...if they wish to play that game, they will have to deal with the consequences.
Sir, I hope you are correct about that being a deterrent, but they may not care about the 98% of the people you are referring to if they think they can hide deep enough in a mountain to protect their own lives. Also, remember that suicide bombers don't exactly reason from the same viewpoint that we do, particularly if they think they are "ushering in the Mehdi" or something. So they may think it worth doing.. and if done by proxy, and they may think they can avoid consequences, or hide deep enough in the hills to avoid being hit personally. After all, like suicide bombers, they can rationalize it is for the "greater good" that 98% die - as martyrs for Islam and to "usher in the Mehdi."
In the article I posted above called, "Obama accepts a nuclear Iran", it says, "Most analysts believe that for all their extremism, the Iranian rulers are rational actors and would not actually use nuclear weapons. But this is a slender analytical thread to ask Israelis to hang their very lives on. And the danger of Iran proliferating some element of nuclear material or technology to terrorists is much more plausible.
This is followed in the next article "Iran draws ever closer to the Islam bomb" with, "In the days of yesteryear it was gallant, chivalrous even, to allow the opponent to get off the first shot before America took them out. Today…there will be no chance to strike back. The weapons of war are so powerful that he who gets of the first shot, most likely, will be the winner (if there is such a thing as a “winner” in a nuclear war.)"
Your scenerio believes in nuclear war and then still "winning"afterward. This man, though, thinks you are wrong. Hmmm.. which view is correct? His "there will be no chance to strike back. The weapons of war are so powerful that he who gets of the first shot, most likely, will be the winner." OR "there will be several hundred million dead Muslims, within 24 hours...If Tehran wants to play that game, Iran will be rubble very quickly, and 98% of it's population vaporized" as you say?
If there is a nuclear attack on U.S. soil I will associate it with a false flag attack by this governments on its own people. Our government is replete with Eugenistist curious with the effects of a nuclear mushroom cloud upon the AmeriKan people. I have cited the case of the Tuskegee Airman and the experimentation those heros had to endure at the hands of the eugenistist.
Iran is a sovereign country that has right to protect themselves against the imperialist foreign policy of the United States. You advocate the killing of their leaders but history is clear this type of attitude was not taken with Russia when they obtained the bomb. The U.S. in its cowardly fashion knows it cannot beat Russia or China in a conventional or a nuclear war; our military leaders would never think of invading them. In contrast, the U.S. has been itching to obtain control or Iran; why? In our failed attempt to install the Shah of Iran the Iranian Government and its people became an enemy of the U.S. Oil is so important to this blood thirsty country that they have carried out a failed policy in the region for the last 50 years.
Whether you like it or not Iran will obtain the bomb and there is nothing the U.S. can do about it; China and Russia will not agree to sanctions and perhaps they are covertly helping Iran. Do you think the United States will openly challenge either Russia or China, I think not. Next, Syria with the help of Iran will obtain the bomb then Jordan. You cannot stop its development and the technology. The U.S. is the agressor in this region and as I have mentioned their failed policy of domination is the reason why the events have unfolded as they have.
Sara, there are hundreds of American nuclear bombs on submarines, and in hardened bunkers. Iran wouldn't stand a chance. If there were any Iranian survivors, I and millions like me, if we survive, would be glad to hunt the Iranian survivors, and kill them. In a nuclear world, as we have today, there is always danger. Nothing new there. I grew up with the threat that the Russians would nuke us. Didn't happen. Of course a doomsday scenario could happen. But I might get killed walking across the street, like a guy I just saw on the local news this evening. Welcome to the race. The Human Race. We are all headed for the Big Dirt Nap eventually, no getting around it.
Suicide bombers are single actors. Notice that only 1 in maybe 10,000 Muslims actually would be willing to blow themselves up. Not many. How many people in charge of Iran would be willing to risk their own death, to bring on ours? Not many. Not 100%. Not even 1%. There are really not that many people in any given population, who are religious, that are so convinced of their belief, they are willing to kill themselves up. Its a small percentage of any population. It may be higher in Islam than Christianity, but it's still low.
And power is fairly diffused in Iran. The religious nuts have a lot of power, but there are always large groups of people involved in major decisions. It is not just blindly following one leader, so one man deciding to blow up America, and getting the things done, to accomplish that, is extremely unlikely.
Probably, the religious leaders over there, like a lot of religious people in America, probably many of them barely believe in Allah, or God. Jerry Falwell always seemed a complete fake to me. Jimmy Swaggert was a hoor chasing drunk, Jimmy Bakker was a bi-sexual drug abuser, and Ted Haggard, prominent Republican evangelist, is queer as a three dollar bill, and seems more interested in teenage boys and money, than spiritual truth. There are a lot of sick and twisted religious leaders in America, the Catholic Church, and no doubt in Islam too. Why should they be any more sincere? Why should their religious leaders be more normal than ours? And the sickos over there probably don't believe in God, and wouldn't risk their own neck for anything. Why would they, since they don't believe in God? A lot of religious people are complete phonies. Lots of atheists in the pulpit, is my experience. It's probably just about power for many. I'll tell you, if I wanted power over people, I'd start a religion. People will believe anything, and a good bullshitter could make a fortune, in no time. I'm sure Islam is just another power and money game for many so-called Muslim religious leaders.
So, I think, in the end, the fact that many of them are not sincere in their beliefs, and their beliefs are pretty shallow, and the fact that so many of them are not what they appear to be, but are vain, or drug using or alcoholic, or just fearful like the rest of us, of death, or insincere, or just in love with life, or perverted, or love their children, or whatever, all of these human blemishes and characteristics are the things that will actually save us, because only pure religious fanatics will do crazy things, and I don't think most people are pure religious fanatics, and most decisions are made with many people watching and involved, and not all those people are crazy and sincere religious nuts, so they won't act in mass suicide, so in the end their perversions and human blemishes and human propensities will save us, if you follow my logic.
The only people I really fear are truly sincere religious nuts, who think God talks to them, and they have a unique pipeline to eternal truth. Those people are either right, or very dangerous. And of course, they all disagree as to what is right, so that tell me almost all of them must be wrong, by definition.
As Bob Dylan sang, "Two men on the corner, say they are Jesus, one of them must be wrong"
So the whole power apparatus in Tehran would have to move in lock step, for Iran to try to blow up America, while risking killing almost all Iranians, for sure. Would all Iranian leaders be willing to do that? No. Especially not the unbelievers, and queers and drug users and atheists and agnostics among their leaders. They don't believe in heaven, so why would they bother? They think this is all there is. I remember reading about the most so-called sincerely religious Bin Laden family, visiting and partying over in Europe, when Osama was young. Many of the devout Muslim men chased white women, did drugs, and alcohol, some of them had gay affairs. Osama bin Laden's sister in law, Carmen, wrote a book about it. She says that sexual depravity is common in Saudi Arabia, or Sodomy Arabia, as she calls it, and she says the Saudi men are such assholes, that a large percentage of Saudi women turn to lesbian affairs, to keep sane. Read her book, if you don't believe me, by Carmen bin Laden, Inside the Kingdom. So all of Islam, including Iran, is a lot sicker than people might think, and most of it goes unreported, so if you think they are all pure religious fanatics, who would blow all of themselves up, just to kill us, you are wrong.
If they give the bomb to terrorists, most Muslims will die in retaliation, for 100% sure, and I don't think they would be willing to commit mass suicide. Personally, if Muslims nuke an American city, and I were in charge, I'd go for 100% annihilation of all Muslims, innocent or not, and I'm positive a lot of American people would feel the same way. There are 1 billion Muslims in the world. They have to decide if they want to be part of the modern world, and live in peace with us. I'm willing to live in peace, with Muslims. If they do not want to live in peace with us, and they nuke one of our cities, we must kill them all, as far as I am concerned.
It is late and I just popped onto the net and saw your two posts, Rob N and J.M.
Thank you for them. I will reply to them, I'm too tired right now.
However..
I thought I would mention.. do you remember that lady married to Barack Obama, Michelle?
Apparently Michelle Obama is a birther.
At least, this video on youtube shows her being one.
It has gone viral over the weekend and what an amazing video it is.
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Is Michelle Obama a Birther?… Will the Media Attack Her Too?
Monday, April 5, 2010, 10:05 PM
Jim Hoft
Birther Michelle Obama told a crowd in 2008:
“When we took our trip to Africa and visited his home country in Kenya, we took a public HIV test.”
The clip comes from a June 2008 campaign speech she delivered to the Gay & Lesbian Leadership Council of the Democratic National Committee in New York City, as reported by Reuters.
I can agree with most of your assessment, there are not too many, even in the muslim population that are willing to blow him, or herself up, but as 9/11 clearly showed...they were able to get quite a lot of them.
Many of the bombs exploding in Baghdad, was suicide bombs.
When I was in Iraq, and heard about the bombings, almost everyone of them involved a suicide bomber.
So even if there is'nt that many that are willing to do it, the amount that ARE willing is pretty high.
Iran don't need subs, missiles, or a bomber fleet, they have already set up its delivery system, and worked on it for years, terrorists.
Getting hold of another suicide bomber, or suicide crew doesn't seem to hard.
A totalitarian regime have, and will excercise the power to act without the consent of it's population.
It doesn't matter if there are big section of Iran that are against the regime.
Roger, I agree the threat is real. If Iran wants to play the terrorist card, they will get blown up. If there is one thing Muslims learned from 9-11, is that America was willing to fight back. I give Bush credit for that. I don't think Bush thought Iraq was behind 9-11. He didn't think that at all. The invasion of Iraq was intended to send a message to the Muslim world: if you use terrorists to attack our country, we will find a Muslim country, and invade it, kill the leaders, and kill a lot of people in your country. That is a good lesson to teach Muslim countries.
Governments like Iran have gotten away with hiding terrorists in their borders for too long. One thing Iran figured out due to the Iraq War, is this hiding terrorists does not work with America. Governments like Iran cannot pretend they are NOT attacking America when they send out terrorists. Iran knows America will not buy that bullshit. An attack by a terrorist funded or trained by Iran, directly or indirectly, should be looked at as an attack by the government of Iran, on the U.S., and should lead to a declaration of war. That was the lesson for Muslims, from the Iraq War.
If Muslims countries and their leaders still haven't learned that basic lesson, and they still let terrorists train on their soil, and if they let terrorists attack the U.S., then the next lesson they learn will be bigger than the invasion of Iraq. Muslim countries and their leaders must learn to stop terrorists within their own borders, must denounce terrorism, or they will eventually face invasion, like Iraq. The lesson must be clear and unmistakable to Iran's leaders: let terrorists attack us, and we will come, and we will invade, and we will find your leaders, and we will hang them or kill them, like what happened to Saddam. If Iran allows terrorists to attack America, I say invade Iran, find the top 100 religious and civilian leaders, and hang them in public, on live TV, on Al Jezeera.
The choice is up to Iran.
The ultimate solution to terrorists will come from the leaders of Iran, faced with the certainty of their own death, if they fail to act properly. America cannot invade and control all Muslim countries. It is too costly, at a trillion dollars per war. But America can afford lots of quick invasions of Muslim countries, come in and out, kill the top leaders, and then leave. And if Muslim leaders still don't get the message, nuclear bombs are cheap. At that point, I wouldn't waste a trillion dollars on a long war, on a Muslim country that refused to learn these basic lessons and behave. The two bombs dropped on Japan was the cheapest, most cost effective war ever fought, on a dollar per casualty basis.
You people are warmongers! I really believe you like that our soldiers are in the middle east pepetuating an imperialistic foreign policy. Tell me, what sovereign nation has Iran invaded? What war has Iran propagated? The worst you have from Iran is sabre rattling but like this blood thirsty AmeriKan government you will not be satisfied until Iran is invaded.
The U.S. has committed genocide in Iraq a worst atrocity than Saddam Hussein could have imagined. Our troops have killed 1.2 million Iraqis. The genocide in the middle east continues with the deaths of Afghani civilians. George W. Bush and Barack Hussein Obama are the war criminals not Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. It is the U.S. soldier raping Iraq's women and looting their gold and other national treasures. It is George Bush and Barack Hussien living vicariously through these soldiers and imagining themselves actually doing the raping of muslim and carrying off the treasure. These two guys are so power hungry and have a since of self importance that they are really sick individuals. As I have said before our policy in this region has been a failure for the last 50 years.
Sadly, you are brainwashed by AmeriKan propaganda and fail to look at it from Iranian view point. In the last 50 years Iran continues to be the victim of U.S. foreign policy; Iran is a soveregin country and the U.S. attempted through covert operations sought to overthrow the government to install a puppet regime in Iran (Shah of Iran). The people of Iran made it clear that they did not want this dictator. Instead, the people of Iran chose a theocracy. Now, Iran is forced to react to U.S. agression in the region and this reaction is partly based upon the two countries past history. Iranian pursuit of nuclear weapons is normal; a logical step for them to take and will serve (they believe)as a deterrent.
Another mistep in your warmonger foreign policy against Iran is the actions both China and Russia will take if Iran is attacked. Do not be surprised if China and Russia puts a stop to U.S. the further colonization of the middle east. The cowardly U.S. will back down when facing the Great Dragon and the Bear from the east. Hopefully our government leaders are stupid enough to think we can when a conventional war against China and Russia.
Reality is that Iran will obtain nuclear weapons; eventually Syria and Jordon will also obtain this technology. I believe the time frame has been escalated because of U.S. invasion and agression in the region. Ultimately, the U.S. will fail either due to a failed monetary and fiscal policy or at worst China and Russia will say enough.
J.M., You are presuming we could easily trace it back to Iran. What if they hand off the bombs or materials - and seemingly "unaffiliated" operatives here in the US put it together and do the dirty work? How do you prove it was the Iranians? And if you have no absolute proof, you know how people feel - think of US President George W. Bush and his search for WMD in Iraq under Saddam. Everything is unjustified unless you can prove it, including retaliation. You would be seen as a hatemonger who thinks the people behind it are Iranian because you are prejudiced.
Remember, the US has porous borders:
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Terror suspects slip past FBI watch list
By Ben Conery
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Nearly eight years after the Sept. 11 attacks, the FBI's terrorist watch list is so flawed that at least 10 people who should have been kept out of the United States were allowed to cross its borders, an internal audit released Wednesday shows.
Then there is the training camps IN THE US which are raising up terrorists:
===
Springtime in Islamberg
Sunday, May 13, 2007
== Radical Muslim paramilitary compound flourishes in upper New York state
By Paul L. Williams Ph.D., (author of THE DAY OF ISLAM)
With the able assistance of Douglas Hagmann, Bill Krayer and Michael Travis
Friday, May 11, 2007
Situated within a dense forest at the foothills of the Catskill Mountains on the outskirts of Hancock, New York, Islamberg is not an ideal place for a summer vacation unless, of course, you are an exponent of the Jihad or a fan of Osama bin Laden.
Islamberg is a branch of Muslims of the Americas Inc., a tax-exempt organization formed in 1980 by Pakistani cleric Sheikh Mubarak Ali Gilani, who refers to himself as "the sixth Sultan Ul Faqr," Gilani, has been directly linked by court documents to Jamaat ul-Fuqra or "community of the impoverished," an organization that seeks to "purify" Islam through violence.
Though primarily based in Lahore, Pakistan, Jamaat ul-Fuqra has operational headquarters in New York and openly recruits through various social service organizations in the U.S., including the prison system. Members live in hamaats or compounds, such as Islamberg, where they agree to abide by the laws of Jamaat ul-Fuqra, which are considered to be above local, state and federal authority. Additional hamaats have been established in Hyattsville, Maryland; Red House, Virginia; Falls Church, Virginia; Macon, Georgia; York, South Carolina; Dover, Tennessee; Buena Vista, Colorado; Talihina, Oklahoma; Tulane Country, California; Commerce, California; and Onalaska, Washington. Others are being built, including an expansive facility in Sherman, Pennsylvania.
Before becoming a citizen of Islamberg or any of the other Fuqra compounds, the recruits - - primarily inner city black men who became converts in prison - - are compelled to sign an oath that reads: "I shall always hear and obey, and whenever given the command, I shall readily fight for Allah's sake."
In the past, thousands of members of the U.S. branches of Jamaat ul-Fuqra traveled to Pakistan for paramilitary training, but encampments, such as Islamberg, are now capable of providing book-camp training so raw recruits are no longer required to travel abroad amidst the increased scrutiny of post 9/11.
encampments, such as Islamberg, are now capable of providing book-camp training so raw recruits are no longer required to travel abroad amidst the increased scrutiny of post 9/11.
Isn't that sweet? They don't have to leave the country to get terrorism training.
Makes you feel so safe.
And if the nukes are traced to THEM (even if Iran gave them the materials) how do you prove Iran is involved?
Forensics are strained as it is.
We don't even know the "signature" of the bombs in the Iranian secret facilities, so how can we be positive they are involved?
===
Nuclear Terror Would Strain Day-After Bomb Sleuths
Posted June 15, 2009
By CHARLES J. HANLEY
AP Special Correspondent
VIENNA (AP)—If the unthinkable happened, would we be left on the day after, as radioactive dust settled, with the unknowable?
If a terrorist nuclear bomb destroyed the heart of a great city, how would we know who did it, with what? Mideast fanatics with a device improvised from stolen uranium? A weapon smuggled in by a rogue regime? A hijacked U.S. bomb?
Where do you strike back? How do you head off another attack?
Barack Obama calls nuclear terrorism "the most immediate and extreme threat to global security." It's an unthinkable that's being thought about daily in classified corners of world capitals.
But knowledgeable scientists and the investigators behind a new U.S. government report say the American nuclear establishment needs more specialists and more background data on possible bomb sources to do the detective job that awaits on that day after.
"I don't believe the intelligence community is ready for the challenge," said Rolf Mowatt-Larssen, who worked for years as a U.S. intelligence leader on weapons of mass destruction.
The concerns are evident in the June 1 government report, an unclassified version of a classified assessment by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), and in an earlier study by major U.S. scientific organizations.
They say an aging, shrinking corps of nuclear forensic experts and U.S. analytical facilities would be badly stretched if a city-leveling nuclear weapon or a "dirty bomb" spreading radioactivity was detonated in the United States.
The scientists also said international databases cataloging characteristics of nuclear materials worldwide, essential for tracing clues in such an event, are currently "not nearly extensive or usable enough."
"If you have the reference data, you can identify the origin. It's just like a fingerprint database," explained Richard Hoskins, a security expert at the International Atomic Energy Agency, in an interview at the IAEA's Vienna headquarters.
Hoskins keeps a global watch on nuclear smuggling. His IAEA database counts 1,646 incidents of trafficking, theft or loss of nuclear materials since 1995, including 18 involving plutonium or highly enriched uranium, nuclear bomb fuels.
No case involved enough material to build a bomb, and Hoskins said his agency detects no strong evidence of a terrorist network, rather than opportunistic thieves, behind any incident. But they don't know what they don't know, he stressed.
"We know that the size of the problem" — both successful and failed attempts — "is probably substantially larger than the number we have," he said.
And at least one terror group is known to aspire to nuclear status, noted another Vienna-based authority, Roger Howsley, head of the World Institute for Nuclear Security, a newly formed, U.S.-supported body to advise on safeguarding nuclear facilities.
"Al Qaida has said it would if it could," he said.
Terrorists face daunting challenges in trying to steal a usable bomb, or build an effective model if they obtain bomb material, experts say.
But "even the minute chance that terrorists might have that ability changes the equation dramatically," Mowatt-Larssen, an ex-CIA official and former U.S. Energy Department intelligence chief, said at a recent "Post-Nuclear Event" discussion at Washington's Georgetown University.
To prevent equation-altering breakthroughs, nuclear forensics is deployed "pre-detonation," to try to trace material seized from traffickers back to the source, to plug leaks at vulnerable nuclear facilities.
With sophisticated equipment and training, chemists and physicists at U.S. national laboratories and elsewhere can learn much from analyzing a few grams of fissile material. For example:
—The ratio of isotopes in natural uranium — of U-238, U-235 and U-234 — varies from place to place and can tip investigators to where a sample of uranium was mined.
—Plutonium's isotopes vary according to the reactor that made it. Bomb-makers Russia, North Korea, Pakistan and Israel, for example, all have different kinds of plutonium-producing reactors.
—The grain size and shape of bomb material can pinpoint a manufacturing process.
—Even conventional forensic clues contaminating a site or sample — hair, fibers, soil — can help.
The results of atomic sleuthing can be "astounding," Michael R. Carter, a security specialist at California's Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, said at the Georgetown session.
Without elaborating, he said U.S. analysts made "definitive" findings in the case of highly enriched uranium seized from smugglers in the ex-Soviet republic of Georgia in 2006, the most recent such weapons-grade case in Hoskins' files. The material is widely assumed to have come from Russia.
But in many cases pinpoint results would be impossible, because of vast gaps in database information needed to trace fissile material.
"The problem is this kind of data is not shared regularly," said the IAEA's Laura Rockwood. Nuclear fuel manufacturers view it as proprietary information. Governments see national security risks in handing it over, particularly to share with states without nuclear weapons.
Last year's U.S. scientists' report, by a task force of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Physical Society, urged nuclear weapons states to cooperate more closely on an international database.
Klaus Mayer, a nuclear forensic specialist with the European Commission, doesn't see that happening.
"There are so many sensitivities involved," he told The Associated Press by telephone while visiting Georgia. Instead, the Europeans see more promise in a decentralized system of shielded national databases, to be queried in emergencies.
Like the U.S. scientists' report, the new GAO study said the diminishing ranks of veteran American forensic specialists — less than 50 — must be refilled with newly trained Ph.D. radiochemists and other specialists.
Because the U.S. last tested a nuclear bomb in 1992, "few scientists remain at the national laboratories with hands-on experience in using radiochemistry techniques on debris from a nuclear event and analyzing the results," it said.
The GAO said Defense, Homeland Security and other U.S. departments must better coordinate programs for producing new nuclear sleuths, and field analytical gear, to be deployed by hazmat-suited scientists at a scene of devastation, must be modernized.
The relevant agencies either concurred in or had no comment on the GAO's recommendations.
Whatever improvements are made, the assessment by a "CSI: Nuclear" team after an attack can never be cast with absolute certainty — even with a claim of responsibility — and will always take days or weeks to deliver to a president, say those who study the problem.
Cristina Hansell, a scholar at California's Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, figures the Ph.D. detectives might finger an alleged culprit — a surreptitious North Korean bomb, a stolen Russian device, a Pakistani weapon in extremists' hands — "with 65 to 70 percent likelihood."
"Are you going to bomb someone else on that basis?" she wondered.
Such questions will come into sharper focus later this year or early in 2010, when Obama plans a global summit on nuclear security, to better mobilize to face what he says will be a "lasting threat" in a terror-ridden world.
With only a 65 to 70 percent liklihood of being right, "Are you going to bomb someone else on that basis?"
What if the Islamberg compounds people in the US say they did it? And "Al Qaida has said it would if it could," so they will claim responsibility if they can. And these are not a nation you can go and bomb. If it is a "suicide bomber" scenerio, then you have all these Jihadi groups who would most likely be involved, or they would say there were and they would claim responsibility. It will be difficult to make a case and prosecute Iran and be seen to be right. It isn't something with bombs coming over the poles and we can see who launched them. Once Iran's secret facilities are up, who knows what that "signature" will look like, since they won't be sharing it. But even if the experts get 70 percent sure.. people will never feel nuclear devastation of Iran justified for the 30 percent uncertainty. Look at how they felt George W. Bush was not justified in going into Iraq. They will find some way to say you cannot nuke or deal harshly with Iran.
With that argument gone, what will prevent Iran from doing what they know they will not be called to task on?
Today on the prisonplanet.com by Paul Joseph Watson, Neo-Cons Defend Massacre of Iraqi Journalist,Children; discusses "a shoking video released by Wikileaks which shows U.S. Apache helicopters massacring Iraqi journalist and children in Baghdad while laughing about it. This is another example of the bloodthirsty neo-con fascist and their continued atrocities in Iraq. For our Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Hussein Obama 1.2 million dead Iraqis are not enough; like an insatiable appetite that cannot be satisfied George W. Bush and now Barack Hussein Obama wants more dead Iraqis, Afghanis, Pakastanis, Yemenis, and Iranians in conquest of the middle east for its natural resources.
Since George W. Bush views the constitution only as a piece of paper why should I expect him to value human life. Obama has the same foreign policy and the same outlook on human life; they are despicable. They are tyrannts of the highest order. They feed on the blood and the carnage of people who do not want their presence in the region. They are like those abortion doctors who have murdered babies through abortion since 1973.
About RobN's accusations on that video, which I watched. The incident happened when at the height of war, and the second newsman is unable to get there because he is delayed by "the chaos in the area" it says at the end of the clip. This all happened in a known WAR ZONE with the newspaper guys embedded with the enemy. I watched it, it does have this in it, quote, "In the video, starting at the 3:50 mark, one member of this group starts preparing what clearly looks like an RPG launcher, as well as some individuals with AK-47s." They were, therefore, legitimate targets in a war zone, no matter their "casual" attitudes. The man with the RPG aims it at them and it looks like he was just about to fire, but they fly behind the building, so he was unable to launch. Only then did the troops come around the building and shoot.
===
Video: Collateral murder, or the risks of war zones?
posted April 5, 2010
by Ed Morrissey
Wikileaks released a video today of an engagement in Baghdad in 2007 that resulted in the deaths of two journalists from Reuters in an effort to accuse the US of covering up a war crime. Calling the incident “collateral murder,” Wikileaks says that it wants to promote the safety of journalists in war zones with the release of the DoD video, but the video itself shows why the US forces fired on the group — and on the vehicle that came to their aid. Note that the video itself contains NSFW language and graphic images of death (via John Holowach at TrueHigh):
In the video, starting at the 3:50 mark, one member of this group starts preparing what clearly looks like an RPG launcher, as well as some individuals with AK-47s. The launcher then reappears at the 4:06 mark as the man wielding it sets up a shot for down the street.. In 2007 Baghdad, this would be a clear threat to US and Iraqi Army ground forces; in fact, it’s difficult to imagine any other purpose for an RPG launcher at that time and place. That’s exactly the kind of threat that US airborne forces were tasked to detect and destroy, which is why the gunships targeted and shot all of the members of the group.
Another accusation is that US forces fired on and killed rescue workers attempting to carry one of the journalists out of the area. However, the video clearly shows that the vehicle in question bore no markings of a rescue vehicle at all, and the men who ran out of the van to grab the wounded man wore no uniforms identifying themselves as such. Under any rules of engagement, and especially in a terrorist hot zone like Baghdad in 2007, that vehicle would properly be seen as support for the terrorists that had just been engaged and a legitimate target for US forces. While they didn’t grab weapons before getting shot, the truth is that the gunships didn’t give them the chance to try, either — which is exactly what they’re trained to do. They don’t need to wait until someone gets hold of the RPG launcher and fires it at the gunship or at the reinforcements that had already begun to approach the scene. The gunships acted to protect the approaching patrol, which is again the very reason we had them in the air over Baghdad.
War correspondents take huge risks to bring news of a war to readers far away. What this shows is just how risky it is to embed with terrorists, especially when their enemy controls the air. War is not the same thing as law enforcement; the US forces had no responsibility for identifying each member of the group and determining their mens rea.Legitimate rescue operations would have included markings on the vehicle and on uniforms to let hostile forces know to hold fire, and in the absence of that, the hostile forces have every reason to consider the second support group as a legitimate target as well. It’s heartbreaking for the families of these journalists, but this isn’t “collateral murder” — it’s war.
I read a book titled "Epicenter" written by Joel Rosenburg. Joel is a Jew converted to Christanity. He helped to write the Limbaugh newsletter in the early '90's, advised Jack Kemp & Netanyahu, and works for the Heritage Foundation.
His book is based on his research, interviews and Ezekiel 38-39.
His best guess on how the U.S.A. would be attacked with a Nuclear devise would be as follows: A small 5k warhead on a skud type missle launched from a floating platform such as a container ship from 200 miles off the coast and dedinated 40-50 klm above the earth's surface. It would create an "electro magnetic pulse" (Google emp) which would fry every thing electronic over a large area.
Iran has sugsessfully launched a skud missle from a floating platform in the Caspian Sea and detonated a conventional warhead 40-50 klm above the earth's surface according to Joel R. If such a nuclear device were detoniated above N.Y. City it would fry computer chips pretty much throughout the northeast.
That means you couldn't start your car, access your atm, or operate hospital equipment such as kidney dialysis equipment. Imagine being technologically thrust back into the 19th century in a second.
Now imagine 4 such skud missles detoninated above N.Y. City, L.A., Seattle, & Jacksonville, Fl. Food supplies would be stuck in warehouses miles from the cities, utilities such as water, sewer, electricity, and natural gas - shut down.
It would take months (or longer)to re-establish all of above.
Pray for the best but prepare for the worst. Mormans have a year's supply of food & water in their homes. How are you prepared?
Sara said: "And if the nukes are traced to THEM (even if Iran gave them the materials) how do you prove Iran is involved?
.....Cristina Hansell, a scholar at California's Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, figures the Ph.D. detectives might finger an alleged culprit — a surreptitious North Korean bomb, a stolen Russian device, a Pakistani weapon in extremists' hands — "with 65 to 70 percent likelihood."
"Are you going to bomb someone else on that basis?" she wondered."....to answer Christina's question, yes, I would bomb Iran on that basis. As Ann Coulter pointed out, "Not all Muslims are terrorists, but all terrorists are Muslim"
I believe 9-11 was the motivator for the invasion of Iraq. Obviously there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Even Karl Rove finally admitted that, when he pretended to be surprised to find this out. I knew that long before America went in. Obviously that weapons of mass destruction was a cover story, for the real American intention: to punish Muslims for 9-11. They couldn't punish Saudi Arabia directly, because we get too much oil from them. So Bush chose to punish Iraq, probably to finish the business his father started. The message of the invasion was meant for Saudi Arabia and Iran: sponsor terrorists, and you will die. This message was too brutal, and politically subtle, and complex, and required too long an answer, to sell directly to the American public, who would have to be educated into the complexities of logistics of terrorism to understand and support, and that is WAY too complex to hold the average voter's interest, so a cover story was conceived about weapons of mass destruction, to justify and provide a cover for the process of teaching the Arab and Muslim worlds a lesson, by invading Iraq.
So, yes, I would bomb Iran on the basis of, if there is a nuclear terrorist attack on America, odds are, they are behind it. If America gets nuked, Iran gets flattened. And I don't care if the American government has no evidence, or have to invent it to justify nuking Iran. As Sara points out, evidence would be hard to come by, and difficult to prove, so a very very low level of evidence is required, at that point.
That approach is the only thing that makes sense to me. If Iran is playing an asymetrical warfare game, where they change the rules of conventional warfare, and send out covert agents, to carry out random, devestating attacks, on a population, of an unsuspecting country? Under those circumstances, America has to come up with new rules of engagement herself, such as, "If an American city gets nukes, there is a near 100% chance a Muslim was involved, and at least a 95% chance Iran was involved, so Iran gets nuked"....Makes sense to me.
The ball is in the court of Iranian leaders. Play nice, cut the bullshit, stop the con games, stop the terrorists, police your population, or pay the price.
Of course, the terrorists could have been from Saudi Arabia or Pakistan, so a list of suitable countries would have to be drawn up, if America was attacked by a nuclear bomb. Also, Muslim Americans would have to be rounded up, and shot.
As an added thought, if a bunch of American cities got flattened, I don't think it would be difficult to sell to the American public, the idea that Iran should be bombed. In fact, the difficult task would be to convince the American public that Iran, and every other Muslim country, should NOT be flattened. Now, THAT would be a hard sell, when the survival of every American family is at stake.
I remember watching 9-11 live, on TV, and the second airplane hit. I said to myself, "somebody is going to pay for this". I didn't know who or where or when, but I knew someone would pay. And they did. A few thousand Americans lost their lives on 9-11, and the Muslim world paid the price of an invasion of one of their countries, and America was willing to spend a trillion dollars teaching the Muslim world that terrorism does not pay. If a bunch of American cities get nuked, then this damage to America would be thousand or millions times greater than the damage inflicted by 9-11. What cost would America be willing to charge the Muslim world for such a crime? I would guess nuking of several Muslim countries is the minimal price.
J.M. - As for your saying that the US will use the ability to deter Iran by saying we will go after them with nukes if they do attack the USA.. Obama just nixed that - totally.
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Obama Limits When U.S. Would Use Nuclear Arms
By DAVID E. SANGER and PETER BAKER
Published: April 5, 2010
WASHINGTON — President Obama said Monday that he was revamping American nuclear strategy to substantially narrow the conditions under which the United States would use nuclear weapons.
But the president said in an interview that he was carving out an exception for “outliers like Iran and North Korea” that have violated or renounced the main treaty to halt nuclear proliferation.
Discussing his approach to nuclear security the day before formally releasing his new strategy, Mr. Obama described his policy as part of a broader effort to edge the world toward making nuclear weapons obsolete, and to create incentives for countries to give up any nuclear ambitions. To set an example, the new strategy renounces the development of any new nuclear weapons, overruling the initial position of his own defense secretary.
Mr. Obama’s strategy is a sharp shift from those of his predecessors and seeks to revamp the nation’s nuclear posture for a new age in which rogue states and terrorist organizations are greater threats than traditional powers like Russia and China.
It eliminates much of the ambiguity that has deliberately existed in American nuclear policy since the opening days of the cold war. For the first time, the United States is explicitly committing not to use nuclear weapons against nonnuclear states that are in compliance with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, even if they attacked the United States with biological or chemical weapons or launched a crippling cyberattack.
Those threats, Mr. Obama argued, could be deterred with “a series of graded options,” a combination of old and new conventional weapons. “I’m going to preserve all the tools that are necessary in order to make sure that the American people are safe and secure,” he said in the interview in the Oval Office.
White House officials said the new strategy would include the option of reconsidering the use of nuclear retaliation against a biological attack, if the development of such weapons reached a level that made the United States vulnerable to a devastating strike.
Mr. Obama’s new strategy is bound to be controversial, both among conservatives who have warned against diluting the United States’ most potent deterrent and among liberals who were hoping for a blanket statement that the country would never be the first to use nuclear weapons.
Mr. Obama argued for a slower course, saying, “We are going to want to make sure that we can continue to move towards less emphasis on nuclear weapons,” and, he added, to “make sure that our conventional weapons capability is an effective deterrent in all but the most extreme circumstances.”
The release of the new strategy, known as the Nuclear Posture Review, opens an intensive nine days of nuclear diplomacy geared toward reducing weapons. Mr. Obama plans to fly to Prague to sign a new arms-control agreement with Russia on Thursday and then next week will host 47 world leaders in Washington for a summit meeting on nuclear security.
The most immediate test of the new strategy is likely to be in dealing with Iran, which has defied the international community by developing a nuclear program that it insists is peaceful but that the United States and its allies say is a precursor to weapons. Asked about the escalating confrontation with Iran, Mr. Obama said he was now convinced that “the current course they’re on would provide them with nuclear weapons capabilities,” though he gave no timeline.
He dodged when asked whether he shared Israel’s view that a “nuclear capable” Iran was as dangerous as one that actually possessed weapons.
“I’m not going to parse that right now,” he said, sitting in his office as children played on the South Lawn of the White House at a daylong Easter egg roll. But he cited the example of North Korea, whose nuclear capabilities were unclear until it conducted a test in 2006, which it followed with a second shortly after Mr. Obama took office.
“I think it’s safe to say that there was a time when North Korea was said to be simply a nuclear-capable state until it kicked out the I.A.E.A. and become a self-professed nuclear state,” he said, referring to the International Atomic Energy Agency. “And so rather than splitting hairs on this, I think that the international community has a strong sense of what it means to pursue civilian nuclear energy for peaceful purposes versus a weaponizing capability.”
Mr. Obama said he wanted a new United Nations sanctions resolution against Iran “that has bite,” but he would not embrace the phrase “crippling sanctions” once used by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. And he acknowledged the limitations of United Nations action. “We’re not naïve that any single set of sanctions automatically is going to change Iranian behavior,” he said, adding “there’s no light switch in this process.”
Israel distributes biochemical war protection kits
Apr 6 2010
Israel Tuesday began distributing millions of protection kits against biochemical warfare, Deputy Defence Minister Matan Vilnai announced, stressing the campaign was not linked to any imminent threat.
"We have equipped ourselves with millions of protection kits against biological or chemical warfare, and a massive distribution programme for the population started today," Vilnai told army radio.
"Every family in Israel can receive these kits at home and be instructed on how to use them by Israeli postal workers, at an average cost of 25 shekels (five dollars), or pick them up free of charge at post office counters."
Israel has long feared chemical or biological weapons may be used against it in a future conflict involving the Jewish state's arch-foes, Iran or Syria.
Iran does not have the capability to launch a nuclear attack from Tehran so all of this talk of Iranian terrorists is to propagate fear and demonize them. The U.S. could not get its way in Iran (propping up the Shah of Iran) and because of that embarrassment the U.S. has sought revenge against this sovereign nation. Blood thirsty Bush and Obama are the savages not the Iranian leadership.
Bush and Obama are responsible for 1.2 million deaths in Iraq; which can be classified as a genocide. Iran has not invaded another country; it has not killed 1.2 million Iraqis to show its dominance. Iran and its leadership are the not war criminals in the middle east. It the United States and her military idustrial complex that are the war criminals. Bush and Obama have misused our military and should stand trial in Iraq for each death. I can bet that a trial by an Iraqi jury would condemn both Bush and Obama of capital murder in each death leading to their execution.
You are right, everything has a price. In my estimation, The U.S. should be forced by to a precipitious widraw from the middle east and the following is a way to accomplish what Bush and now Obama fail to do: (1). Saudi Araiba, Venezuela, and the other members of OPEC should immediately halt all shipment of oil to the United States and the United Kingdom until a unilateral withdraw from the middle east is complete. (2). Next, China should dump those 1.3 trillion U.S. denomianted toxic assets they are holding and refuse to fiance anymore U.S. debt There are other parts of the world for China to sell its goods. (3). Russia should stop all heating oil exports to the United Kingdom (4). Chile and other South American countries should halt all food exports to the United States. (5). UN sanctions imposed upon the United States.
Once the U.S. chose to a unilateral withdraw from the region these five conditions would be lifted. If the U.S. chose to continue its perpetual war then these five conditions would remain in place.
Rob N: The world, like a company, needs a boss, to be stable, and develop. Without America, the world would descend into anarchy.
Sara, Ronald Reagan, your great hero, himself embraced the idea of a nuclear free world. I think that is going too far. I still stand by my position that if the terrorists nuke an American city, Tehran must be leveled with a mushroom cloud. Muslim state must be told this, so there is clarity, and absolutely no confusion as to what will happen if terrorists nuke one of our cities. The reserve option must always be, if Muslims let terrorists attack us from their soil, whether that Muslim country is a nuclear power or not, we nuke them.
The article is unclear on what would happen under that scenario, as per this Quote:
"White House officials said the new strategy would include the option of reconsidering the use of nuclear retaliation against a biological attack, if the development of such weapons reached a level that made the United States vulnerable to a devastating strike."
and this quote:
"But the president said in an interview that he was carving out an exception for “outliers like Iran and North Korea” that have violated or renounced the main treaty to halt nuclear proliferation."
My guess is, if terrorists nuked one of our cities, Obama would be forced to level Tehran, or risk being assassinated, or impeached. If he did not strike back, he would be impeached, and replaced by someone who would hit back.
Sorry, I do not agree. The world needs a boss about as much as african-american slaves needed a slave master. I think this is a fit analogy of what is happening in the middle east. The United States is attempting to enslave an entire people who care nothing at all for the West. Bush and Obama wish to here from the mouths of the Arab, "yes sir, massa Bush". or "yes sir, massa Obama." "I be your good Arab slave".
The correct foreign policy in the region is to allow the each Arab state to determine its own future without the influence of the AmeriKa or its minion Great Britian. The Arab world has a right to self-determination and self-reliance as any country in the west.
Rob, America sends hundred of billions of dollars a year, to buy oil from Arab countries.....some SLAVE!
I thought slaves worked for free!
Rob, like it or not, it's human nature, someone is always top dog. If it is not us, someone else will want the job.
I'd rather be a hammer than a nail.
The Arabs spent 1000 years, invading, and re-invading Europe in holy wars, so don't give me any crap about Arabs being peaceful.
Arabs used to own a lot of the world, and invaded Iran originally, and killed 50% of the population, who were Christian at the time, and forced to convert to Islam, or die by the sword.
The Mongols invaded most of Asia, and a lot of Europe.
The Italians took over Europe, the middle east and northern Africa, in the Roman Empire.
The Germans recently tried to take over the world.
The French ruled most of Europe a few hundred years ago.
The Turks had a huge empire at one time.
The Incas had a huge empire, forced by the sword, in South America.
The Mayans murdered their way to power over Mexico and Central America.
Africa used to have a lot more ethnic groups, and now look more alike because one group, from around Nigeria, murdered and raped their way across Africa over hundreds of years, killing the men, raping the women, and colonizing Africa.
The white man stole North America from the Indians. If you live in the States, why the hell don't you go back home to Europe, you imperialist, land stealing whitey?
The land under your feet belongs to the red man, you thief, and hypocrite.
The British ran a lot of the world not too long ago.
The Persian Empire (Iran) was at one time huge, and enslaved many people, including the Jews, for a while.
China has many ethnic groups. China started when one of those ethnic groups imposed their will on the others.
So what the hell is new Rob?
Same shit, different century.
People are aggressive. That won't stop. Humans being aggressive won't stop. It's best to have one strong nation in charge. Luckily, that is us at this time. We aren't so bad when you compare us with other people who have ruled the world.
Arabs make too much money to be our slaves, although WE are THEIR oil slaves.
Rob said: " The U.S. has committed genocide in Iraq a worst atrocity than Saddam Hussein could have imagined. Our troops have killed 1.2 million Iraqis."
Rob, you bought some Iraqi Dinar, and the only way to make money on this investment is if America wins a war, and you knew perfectly well from the start what war is: it's killing people. And you bought your blood money, and now you suddenly have a conscience?
Reality about casualties, not propaganda, as of 2007-2008:
Civilian Casualties
Estimates of civilian casualties vary. According to Fox News, March 20, 2007, over 54,000 civilians have been killed in the war. [105] However, due to suicide bombings and other such activity, the fatalities caused by US/Coalition forces in action was only 31 percent of the total number given according to CNN's report October 2006, [106] down from 32 percent quoted by this Boston Globe report [107] dated December 19, 2005. In the Fox News study, that would mean 16,740 of the 54,000 casualties. On November 11, 2006, Iraqi Health Minister Ali al-Shamari estimated that between 100,000 and 150,000 civilians had been killed during the war.[108] A 2008 estimate by the World Health Organization placed the civilian death toll at 151,000.[109]
The worst case here by the WHO in 2008 is 151,000, not 1.2 million, and certainly a million did not die in 2009, the election year. And the real RobN would know this, not this one, but the one who used to post, because we went through all that propaganda and where they cooked the numbers.. so he would have known that statistic to be wrong. This is not the same RobN, but only someone using his name. Perhaps our old RobN died and this person just took on his name. Either that or he has Alzheimers and forgot the long, drawn out debate we did on it. But that debate we did on here went on for months.. I doubt the real RobN would have forgotten.
=== Soros Funded 600K Iraq Casualties Study was a Sham....
January 11, 2008
January 10, 2008 -- Anti-Bush billionaire George Soros helped finance a dubious study of Iraqi casualties that was rushed into print on the eve of the 2006 elections, according to a new report.
Soros, who gave more than $20 million to prevent President Bush's re-election, contributed $45,000 of the $145,000 that was spent on the study, the National Journal disclosed.
The study, which The Lancet, a British medical journal, published three weeks before the midterm elections, made major headlines around the world with claims that some 650,000 Iraqis died in the war to overthrow Saddam Hussein and the ensuing chaos.
Two of the study's co-authors told the National Journal that they opposed the war and submitted their findings to Lancet with the insistence that it appear before the election.
The 650,000 figure was regarded with skepticism when the study appeared because it was vastly higher than estimates by the US government (30,000) and the Iraqi government (50,000).
Even an antiwar activist group, Iraq Body Count, claimed 45,000 dead, a fraction of the Lancet figure.
I do not have any Dinar they have been sold! sold! sold! It is a dead investment. The world can force the U.S. out of middle east and once those five steps are initiated you will see the U.S. and their blood thirsty imperialistic conquest end. The failure of the AmeriKa in the middle east is possible and can be accomplished.
I have been reading all these ideas and philosphies about the role of the USA in the world. I do not see the USA as a forceful, domineering country who is trying to impose its will and way of life on other countries.
What I do see is a country who wants peace at any cost and wants to fight a war without any casualties. It appears to me that in Iraq that we fight back only after we have suffered a casualty or dodged a bullet. I think that many Arab countries would like to be invaded so long as all damages are repaired and the country is put on a sound financial footing before departing.
Contrary to RobN's evaluation of the USA, I see us as a passive, obligating entity who is commiting enormous sums of money to try and sway some countries opinion. The latest idea of reducing nuclear devices is insane. It has been proven that we reduce ours and they do not reduce theirs. I wish that RobN was right that the USA was a forceful, domineering, diabolical force that would do most anything to protect this country but I no longer believe that our government has the best interest of the country at heart.
In my younger years, I never questioned the actions of the US Government as I believed that anything that they did was in the best interest of the country and if they erred in their pursuits then I would back them 100% as they were trying to do what was best for the country.
The first crack in the dike for me was when Bush went into Iraq. With the limited information that I had, I saw it as a wasteful venture as what kind of harm could Iraq put on us? If they had a few WMD's, so what. What could they do with them? I see Iran as a much greater threat with nuclear capabilites and we are willing to live with it.
RobN, the USA is becoming a Teddy Bear who seeks peace with everyone and is willing to disarm and hope that everyone else will also.
It will be beautiful world when we no longer have the threat of nuclear bombs.
J.M., Roger, Neil.. look at this.
It backs up a lot of what you are saying as true.
Even if it cannot be heard by many, I think it may be heard by you.
=== Our Man Inside Iran’s Revolutionary Guards
April 6, 2010
In 1979, a coalition of Iranian liberals, leftists, and Islamists overthrew the tyrannical Shah Reza Pahlavi—and a new regime more dangerous and brutal than the last took its place.
An alliance of liberals, leftists, and Islamists made sense at first. The Shah oppressed them all more or less equally. But the Iranian Revolution, like so many others before it, devoured its children. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and his Islamists emerged the strong horse in the post-revolutionary struggle for power, and they liquidated the liberals and leftists.
One young Iranian man, who now goes by the name Reza Kahlili, joined Khomeini's Revolutionary Guards right at the beginning. He quickly became disillusioned, however, when he saw young people tortured and murdered in Tehran's notorious Evin Prison. Repressing his countrymen was not what he had in mind when he signed up. Rather than quit and place himself and his family under suspicion, he contacted the CIA and agreed to work as an American agent under the code name "Wally."
"My role was to look and act the part of a devout Muslim enforcing all the new rules laid down by the mullahs," he writes in his terrific book A Time to Betray: The Astonishing Double Life of a CIA Agent Inside the Revolutionary Guards of Iran, which was released today by Simon and Schuster. "A full black beard was a mandatory accessory to the Guards' uniform, and I sported one along with every other member of the Guards. The image of a scowling black-bearded Guard in uniform mustered fear and garnered respect. Playing the part of a zealot did not come naturally to me, and there were times I had to do things I dreaded: cautioning young girls to cover up, barking at kids for not displaying proper Islamic behavior, taking on the persona of a fanatic. I knew I would have to try to convince myself that doing these things allowed me to maintain my role—and maintaining my role allowed me to contribute to the downfall of the organization to which I so fervently imitated allegiance."
Reza lives safely in Los Angeles now, though he hasn't stopped doing whatever he can to contribute to the downfall of his home country's repressive regime—a regime he understands better than most having spent so many difficult years pretending to serve it.
He and I spoke for an hour on the phone over the weekend.
---
MJT: Khomeini portrayed himself then as a democrat.
Reza Kahlili: Absolutely. I hope that I show that in the book. He deceived Iranians. He presented himself as a democrat. Everything he said indicated that different political parties would be involved, that the clerics would not interfere, that people would have the right to choose whatever they wanted. But he lied through his teeth. Everything he said was a lie. Nobody expected that from him because he was a figure from the 1960s. He was criticizing the Shah when nobody else dared to. Everybody thought of him as an honest, righteous man.
MJT: When we look at Iran now, it's obvious that a huge percentage of Iranians don't like the government. But we didn't see these big demonstrations or hear much criticism of Khomeini in the 1980s. After he seized control, after he ran President Banisadr out of office and so on, it appeared, from here in the United States, that most Iranians supported him.
Reza Kahlili: This is the fault of the Western media. Barely one year into the revolution, a majority of the people wanted Khomeini and the clerics gone. They started clamping down on every sector of the society after just four or five months. Then there was the hostage-taking, political parties were banned, and women were forced to wear hijab. Hezbollah gangs were in the streets. It all happened very quickly. People realized a much worse dictatorship was coming, and that's when the resentment against Khomeini began.
Before the revolution, mainstream Iranians didn't have that much resentment against the United States. Many Americans lived there. And from 1981 or so, and throughout the 1980s and 1990s, people were praying every day and night that there would be a coup or that the U.S. would do something. They wanted to be freed from these clerics. There were demonstrations, there were uprisings, but they were never covered by the foreign mass media. They weren't as large as the ones we're seeing lately, so they were clamped down fast. Demonstrators were taken to prison, tortured, and killed.
MJT: What is this government's ultimate goal?
Reza Kahlili: Every opinion put out by the Western analysts over the years has been wrong. Just last year Newsweek came out and said everything we know about Iran is wrong, but they found out a month later that they were wrong about everything they said. The same with the New York Times reporter, I forget his name.
The idea that this government is a dictatorship that wants to sustain power and therefore won't do anything like use a nuclear bomb is incorrect, I think. They have shown through their behavior over the past three decades that they have one goal, and that's to confront the West.
If you look more deeply into the thought processes of the people controlling the government, these are people who strongly believe Islam will conquer the world. Every act they commit is in that direction. They don't just want a nuclear bomb to make them untouchable. They think it will be the trigger for Islam conquering the world.
If all they wanted was to protect their government, as many are saying, they have the best opportunity right now. They can negotiate with the West, join the global economy, be respected and all that, but they refuse to do so.
MJT: So do you think if they acquire nuclear weapons they will actually use them?
Reza Kahlili: They will. ... moving toward the goal of destroying Israel, bringing the imperialistic system of economics to a halt, creating chaos, and waiting for the Mahdi to appear. It's all right out in the open. Just look at their Mahdi philosophy. (url)
MJT: They do say all this stuff out in the open. It's just a bit hard for some of us to believe that they actually believe it. I take Iran more seriously than most Americans, and it's still a bit hard for me to believe this.
Reza Kahlili: Look. It is hard for Westerners to believe this kind of philosophy. The problem is that everyone here has been raised with freedom and democracy. You are free to conduct your own research and have your own opinions. So this philosophy immediately sounds to you like nonsense. I mean, why would they want to do such things? ... They believe what they say. I know they do. I know Khamenei has private prayers with the Mahdi. It's all crazy talk, but they take it seriously. Thirty years ago they were told the Mahdi wants them to proceed with the nuclear project, and that's why they're not bending. They think they're untouchable and that the Mahdi wants it.
It would be a disaster for the world. They should not be allowed to become a nuclear armed power. It should be totally unacceptable.
MJT: When you say the mullah's lobbies in Washington, who exactly are you talking about?
Reza Kahlili: They are groups that represent the Iranian-American societies in the U.S. All you have to do is look and see who does what.
MJT: I think I know who you mean.
Reza Kahlili: There are quite a few of them. Every one of them has tried to persuade Congress and the White House not to implement sanctions. They were successful during the time of President Clinton. Madeleine Albright publicly apologized, as that was one of the requirements for normalization.
These are the open acts they've done. There are more in back channels. These people have access to the State Department, and they travel to Iran. They lead the U.S. administrations into inaction.
Right now, President Obama is another casualty of those people. He got signals from Ahmadinejad and others, the same characters, who said he should try to bend backwards and send a letter directly to Khamenei. And here we are, a year later. Not only has that not worked out, putting pressure on China and Russia hasn't worked out. China and Russia don't agree with crippling sanctions. They just want a watered-down resolution that isn't going to have much effect.
Reza Kahlili: Israel is a special subject. People in Iran do not sympathize with Israel the way they sympathize with the U.S. They're looking for help, right? But they're not looking for the same kind of help from Israel.
So if Israel bombs the facilities in Iran, don't expect people to come out into the streets to celebrate or confront the government forces. That's not going to happen. They're just going to sit at home and pray this thing doesn't get out of hand.
Reza Kahlili: Israel will take a big penalty for doing such, but the Obama Administration might drag its feet so long that the Israelis think they have no other choice. There will be a major war if they do it, most likely. I mean, nobody knows, as you said. But it's likely, and Israel could pay a very heavy price.
If the Israelis do this, the West had better support them and make sure it means the end of the Iranian government. Just a hit and run won't solve anything.
MJT: What if the Israelis destroyed the Revolutionary Guards? How might the Iranian people react to that?
Reza Kahlili: That would be very different from just destroying the nuclear facilities. I would say that if any power takes on the Revolutionary Guards, they will find sympathy from the Iranian people. Even Israel.
MJT: Iranians don't hate Israel the way Arabs do.
Reza Kahlili: No. It's very different. We have family members who are Jewish. This wasn't a problem during the Shah's time. Iranian people do not hate Israel like they do in Arab countries. We aren't Arabs. Persians are very different from Arabs. I'm sure you know that.
MJT: Oh, yes.
Reza Kahlili: There is animosity between Persians and Arabs. I mean, I don't think there is anything wrong with Arabs, I don't want to sound like a racist, we're all humans, but Iranians feel animosity toward Arabs, even more now since the revolution.
MJT: Why more now? Because of the Iran-Iraq war or because of Khomeini's Arabization policies?
Reza Kahlili: Because of the religion. Iranians believe that what the mullahs have brought to Iran is the religion of Arabs. A lot of Iranian officials, many of them, lived in Iraq and Syria for so many years that they speak Arabic better than they speak Persian.
And on top of that, the clerics have continuously attacked our Persian heritage. Every custom that Iranians have is being replaced with an Arab one. This is something Iranians really resent.
MJT: Let's say President Barack Obama invites you to the White House and says, "Reza, I need your advice. What should I do?" What would you tell him?
Reza Kahlili: I would tell him that he needs to do the following, and this is just my opinion, obviously.
Immediately, the Western countries should cut off all shipping lines and air lines, and deport all Iranians who work in offices connected to the Iranian government. They're Quds Force members. They're intelligence guys. Deport them. And stop sending refined oil to Iran. They rely on that.
Corner the country and give them a deadline. And if the Iranian government doesn't give up its program, take it out. Do not allow this country to become nuclear armed. Sanctions are not going to work.
In the worst case scenario, if there is a military confrontation, do not invade the country. Do not destroy the country. Take the Revolutionary Guards out. If you take the Revolutionary Guards out, this government can't last 24 hours.
We know all their bases. We know all their officers. We know all their buildings. If they move in convoys, take them out. And that will be the end of this government.
MJT: [Long silence.]
Reza Kahlili: It needs a lot of courage and understanding of what we're facing right now. All this talk of sanctions and ultimatums is not going to change anything.
MJT: The administration does not want to hear this. Nobody wants to hear this. And I have a hard time imagining anything like it happening.
Reza Kahlili: Yes.
But the advantage of this government not being in the Middle East will be huge. It will weaken Hezbollah, Hamas, Syria, Venezuela [laughs], and bring benefits to many parts of the world.
It will weaken China and Russia and their foreign policies. It would be huge. If we are able to achieve this, not only would it be fantastic for the people of Iran, it would benefit the whole world.
You've read my book. You know where my heart is.
MJT: Yes.
Reza Kahlili: I'm in pain because of my people. I'm in pain because of what I've seen. I'm in pain because the West doesn't get it. I didn't have to come out, Michael. I was living under the radar. Nobody even knew I existed. I'm putting myself out there to get this message across, to sound an alarm, and hoping that somebody will listen.
Reza Kahlili is a pseudonym used by the author to protect himself, his family, and his friends from retaliation by the Iranian government. He lives somewhere in Los Angeles. You can order your copy of A Time to Betray: The Astonishing Double Life of a CIA Agent Inside the Revolutionary Guards of Iran from Amazon.com.
Rob N:
I spent 3 and one half yeats in Iraq, and iI figure you spent diddly squat there, and I don't know where you're gettin you figures, but the Amercians haven't even come close to killing 1.2 million Iraqis, if there have been 1.2 million Iraqis murdered, it was by the hnds of Iraqi, pakistanis,syrian,and iranis. . .so get you shit straight, I was in the thickof things being 45 miles from Baghdad, 35 miles from Baquba,15 miles from Balad and 60 miles from tikrit, and the rapes you talk about, I know of two incidents, and the culprits were tried and convicted and sententenced to leavenworth. . .you have become traitorously malignant to this site, I held one of the most important jobs in Iraq, monitoring all incoming freight from turkey and kuwait, and everything coming and going were maifested through me. . .so until you've actually experienced Iraq, you should keep your big mouth shut. . .you're talking 3rd party bullshit. . .sorry to talk like this but I've been there and done that and you haven't. . .P.H.
Concerning my figure of the Iraqi body count of 1.2 million dead as a direct result of the U.S. invasion is an reliable figure; though you do not hear this discussed in our state media. How many links would you like me to post? The following are three: www.justforeignpolicy.org, www.projectcensored.org, and www.reuters.com/articles/idUSL3048857920080130.
I have also myself been there, have been shot at, small arms, Rocket Propelled Grenades, and personally seen convoys being blown up by IED's on more than one occasion, I have seen tracers, flying all over, bouncing off guntrucks. I have sen more illumination flares than I care to count, and heard and seen artillery to the point that it is just ordianry background noise. I have participated in convoys where we were heavily involved in fights, have been on missions that was critical, on the last part I have personally a military citation of appreciation, for cruicial support of a critical mission.
In the line of work I did, about 20 of us have been killed, and we have a memorial for them all inscribed on a wall on Base Anaconda.
I have been to Kirkuk, Baghdad, Tikrit, Mosul, Falluja, Taji, Tallil. I have been to an endless amount of smaller bases, been in sandstorms, blackouts. I have runned big vehicles over half blown up railroad bridges, or pontoonbridges, Ive been right out in the plain desert, smaller cities, bigger cities, night and day, and the daily endless massacres on millions of Iraqis done by the US military is delusional.
I have been in lot of places in Baghdad, amongst them night missions right into the heat, in Sad'r city.
My work involved Kevlar helmet and flame prof coverall, armed vehicles, and bullet proof glass, and occasionaly because the nature of the job, I had to expose myself in such a way, that a sniper could pick me off.
I've seen personally how we conduct the war, I have personally been where the action is, and this little Rob N, delusional piece of shit, are sitting on this site, in his cozy little apartment somewhere, doing daly lies, after lies, after lies, he keeps on coming with blatant lies, complete self delusional, he is sitting here on this site, telling us over and over again, how things "really are" over there.
Rob N.
I hereby accuse you....on good grounds...to be a liar.
You just lie, beacuse you just don't know, ...so you make it up.
That's what idiots do.
As far as I am concerned , you are endlessly insulting people, with your lies, under the cover of being an intellectual discussion.
You don't hold Dinars, you are not interested in Dinars, and you don't care about Dinars.
You are onto this site ONLY to spread you endless stupid lies,...you just don't have a clue.
Even if the truth would serve you well, you prefer to lie.
"Fat Man and Little Boy" is an interesting movie, with Paul Newman in it. Paul says at one time that a large percentage of the American scientists who worked on the Manhatten Project, when America created the first nuclear bomb, a lot of those scientists were Jewish. That's true, in America, in Europe, in Russia, a lot of the Russian scientists who created their bomb were Jewish, like Andrei Sakharov, who developed Russia's H-Bomb.
There has been a small but very influential Jewish community in Iran for a couple thousand years. I'd bet my right
leg a lot of the Iranian scientists who are working on the Iranian nuclear bomb are Jewish. They are doing it out of loyalty to their country, and to protect their families.
America says it doesn't know where Iran is hiding it's nuclear facilities.
Here is something you may not have heard this morning; the U.S. puppet Karazi in Afghanistan has decided to align himself with the Taliban. This has got the Whitehouse in a dither; the court jester Obama plans to snub the visiting Afgahni leader. A defeat in Afghanistan is good for the region. Karzai will want to be careful; he will end up like Saddam Hussein acting independantly from his puppet-masters. It made me chuckle. I suppose Karazi wants a larger cut of the drug trade.
DINAR ADMIN.
I think things have gone to far here on this board,when people talk about our service men and women.WHEN YOU TALK ABOUT OUR FIGHTEN MEN AND WOMEN YOUR WALKEN ON THE FIGHTEN SIDE OF ME!!!!!!
GOD BLESS AMERICA
I hear Rob N talkin' bad,
About the way we have to live here in this country,
Harpin' on the wars we fight,
An' gripin' 'bout the way things oughta be.
An' I don't mind Rob switchin' sides,
An' standin' up for things he believes in.
When he's runnin' down my country, man,
He's walkin' on the fightin' side of me.
Yeah, walkin' on the fightin' side of me.
Runnin' down the way of life,
Our fightin' men have fought and died to keep.
If Rob don't love it, leave it:
Let this song I'm singin' be a warnin'.
If you're runnin' down my country, man,
You're walkin' on the fightin' side of me.
I read about some squirrely guy named Rob,
Who claims, he just don't believe in fightin'.
An' I wonder just how long,
The rest of us can count on bein' free.
He loves our milk an' honey,
But he preaches about some other way of livin'.
When he's runnin' down my country, hoss,
He's walkin' on the fightin' side of me.
Yeah, walkin' on the fightin' side of me.
Runnin' down the way of life,
Our fightin' men have fought and died to keep.
If Rob don't love it, leave it:
Let this song I'm singin' be a warnin'.
If you're runnin' down my country, man,
You're walkin' on the fightin' side of me.
Yeah, walkin' on the fightin' side of me.
Runnin' down the way of life,
Our fightin' men have fought and died to keep.
If you don't lov
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