"Puppet regimes" are back in the Middle East. Once again, they're promoting peace, diversity and the importance of brushing your teeth. New episodes of "Sesame Street" are going on TV in Israel and the Palestinian territories, producers said Sunday, years after the original versions signed off because of a lack of funds.
As with the popular U.S. program - designed to enhance basic educational content for youngsters - producers tailored the Mideast casts and story lines to the fit the audiences.
"Rechov Sumsum," the Israeli version, features a Muppet of Arab origin for the first time. Arab puppets have been used in other versions of the show elsewhere around the world. New human actors on the Israeli version include Jewish immigrants from Russia and Ethiopia, communities that have faced ill treatment from some veteran Israelis.
The Palestinian counterpart, "Shara'a Simsim," seeks to offer positive role models to boys in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Wonder if it includes any characters of the Jewish or Israeli persuasion?
"It's really about respect and tolerance," said Gary Knell, president of Sesame Workshop, the New York-based nonprofit group behind Sesame Street programming worldwide. "We know that television teaches - the question is, 'What does it teach?'"
Posted by: Bobby ||
04/30/2007 06:19 ||
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#1
Would a Mohamhead muppet spark a series of riots?
#5
Wonder if it includes any characters of the Jewish or Israeli persuasion?
Probably not, but if you've seen some of the Palestinian's children's shows, you'll be happy about any TV show that doesn't indoctrinate a terrorist mentality into their kids.
#6
Shara'a Simsim: I thought it was inappropriate to reproduce something in the image of a human. eg. The statues blown up by the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Do the female puppets wear full covering?
Abaya, Hijab, Burka and are they always in the company of male aquaintances to maintain their virtue??
#7
Actually, Pølles Køkken, on the same play list, is effing hilarious. Forget that it's in Danish. Imagine a drunk male Julia Child working off of a dockside cart and constantly passing out while stirring the food with fireworks. Priceless!
San Francisco Bay area residents faced nightmarish commutes Monday after one of the region's most traveled sections of freeway melted and collapsed following a fiery crash. Melted. The author's as ignorant as Rosie.
An elevated section of highway that carries motorists from the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge to a number of freeways was destroyed early Sunday after heat from an overturned gasoline truck caused part of one overpass to crumple onto another.
"I've never seen anything like it," said Officer Trent Cross of the California Highway Patrol. "I'm looking at this thinking, 'Wow, no one died' _ that's amazing. It's just very fortunate."
Authorities predicted the crash would cause the worst disruption for Bay Area commuters since a 1989 earthquake damaged the Bay Bridge itself. The sight of a soaring freeway twisted into a fractured mass of steel and concrete was reminiscent of the damage from the Loma Prieta quake.
Posted by: Bobby ||
04/30/2007 06:08 ||
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#1
It must have been the BushHitlerHalberton plot to steal California oil since steel doesn't melt! CONTROLLED DEMOLITIONS!!!! THE GOVERNMENT IS BEHIND IT!!! /liberalmoonbat
#4
What a mess. News footage I saw had two elevated levels collapsed onto the ground level road. I imagine for safety reasons, each level will have to be reconstructed in series, doubling the time. Maybe Frank could tell us more.
Posted by: ed ||
04/30/2007 8:59 Comments ||
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#7
I was there for the 89 quake. One of the proudest civic "we can do" moments in Bay Area history was getting the Bay Bridge reopened in about 6 weeks.
Funny how all of the impact studies, civilian utopian consensus building meetings go right out the window when a large chunk of moonbats, (as well as some of the more conservative people I know) can't get across the Bay.
This scenario, BTW, would be palyed out in 10 or more locations when the big one "wakes up". Sure hope we have those pollution free Jetson cars, (with appropriate carbon offseting and cupholders standard) that run on unicorn gas ready in time for the Big One.
#9
#6. I know how you feel, Sea. About 20 years ago I ran some tests at March AFB, but the nearest hotel available was in San Bernadino. After being told that the I10/I215 interchange was built on a fault line, the commute became more interesting. I always looked around to see if anything was shaking before driving up on the overpass.
#10
"Bush lied while drivers died." Oh, no one died. O.K.: "Bush lied while the highway fried." O.K. well somehow it's Bush's fault--he didn't sign the Kyoto treaty???
#11
It's mornings liek today (and the next week or so) that I thank God I don't have to commute to the Bay Area. I wonder who is responsible for this:
a) Neocons
b) Bushitler
c) Haliburton
d) A low-bar selection process for truck drivers
#12
Much as I detest the nanny state mentality, I'd say that this incident proves the need for speed governors and "black boxes" on all bulk petroleum transport carriers. There has already been speculation that the driver was speeding. While my suggestion won't prevent all cases of unsafe driving, at least the black box will record those events so that the driver can be disqualified from future trucking jobs. This incident carries HUGE hidden costs (i.e., lost productivity, expanded commute times, unnecessary gasoline consumption, increased surface street wear, excess auto emissions, etc.), that will push damages well above one billion dollars.
I'll give the Governator due credit. He decreed all mass transit in the area (BART, ferries, AC Transit) to be free today to speed up adoption of alternative transportation. Damn good thinking coming from the Capitol house.
#14
Notice that all the construction was
*reinforced concrete columns
*steel built up beams on the columns holding the spans
*steel beams between columns with concrete roadway.
The fire heated up the steel beams and caused them to become plastic hinges, as the steel was exposed, unlike steel in skyscrapers, which is coated with fireproofing.
The Caldecott Tunnel going through the Berkeley hills was closed for a year or so due to a tanker fire. That one killed 7 people, IIRC. They changed the hours of tanker operations through the tunnel to the wee hours of the morning.
One can see, however, that a series of tanker fires in strategic places would be a veddy veddy bad thing. Wonder how checks on CDL applications with hazmat certifications are coming? Better than patrolling our borders, I hope. I would assume nothing, in either case.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/30/2007 16:11 Comments ||
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The worst is still to come. This morning, the commute into the city was not all that affected except perhaps for a few lookie-loos and maybe some people on 80 heading farther south.
This afternoon, starting at about 2pm PDT 140 thousand cars that headed across the Bay will start trying to cross in the east direction. They will be forced to already crowded surface streets in most cases for at least part of the journey home.
Bad things are going to happen - and the prediction is that tomorrow will be the worst day of all.
#16
they can be rebuilt concurrently, it just makes the falsework trickier, and giving adequate workspace to lift, position forms, beams, and rebar is difficult
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/30/2007 16:25 Comments ||
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This location can't be more than a mile or 2 from the Nimitz collapse site in 89. My guess it is new feeders from that project that are being repaired here.
This reminds me very little of the time I was reviewing plans a friend had gotten drawn up for the construction of an entertainment hall in Montego Bay, Jamaica. I'll never forget the look of astonishment on his face when I asked him if he had calculated in the expense of all the plywood and 2x4s he was going to need during the concrete pour. He asked why we needed wood when this thing was going to be made out of concrete.
I had to patiently explain how forms (i.e., falsework) had to be constructed to hold the wet concrete in place while it hardened. Once I saw that he was completely ignorant of what was involved, I redrew the plan for his 60' octagon building and used waffle-plate sections cantilevered over the cinderblock walls as a floor for the ceiling's pour. This eliminated a center pole that would have blocked internal sight lines and made supports for a balcony system possible as well.
I managed to increase seating capacity, improve visibility of the stage and reduced costs at the same time. He then gave me his business plan which was composed of pure conjecture instead of financial projections. I redlined the entire document and he refused to believe it was so flawed. I told him to take it to his accountant who tossed the whole thing into his wastebasket after hitting page two.
It is simply astonishing how so many people evidently think that civil engineering must rely upon magic or supernatural forces in order to be accomplished.
#20
Cyber Sarge -
While 'd) A low-bar selection process for truck drivers' may be the correct answer I would not discount the possibility of some bad auto driver cutting the trucker off and causing him to suddenly swerve or hit his brakes. There are low-bar or even unlicensed drivers of all sorts of vehicles.
Found through a specialized newsletter I get; link is to the letter.
In an April 10 letter from the EPA's Children's Health Protection Advisory Committee to EPA Administrator Steven Johnson, which said the agency had neglected opportunities it could have used to better protect children, the Children's Health Protection Advisory Committee also said:
"Children will suffer disproportionately from climate change and its consequences. It is imperative that EPA address how climate change uniquely affects children and take steps to mitigate this significant threat to the globe." (Emphasis added)
OK, folks - it's now official. Get with the program. Hang on to your wallets.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/30/2007 12:43 ||
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I don't pay attention until they add "women and minorities" to complete the hat trick...
#7
I'm fueling my 4X4 crewcab F150 on baby ducks - they're small enough to make the fill pipe
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/30/2007 16:29 Comments ||
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#8
I refuse to be mocked by the vast right wing conspiracy. After all, carbon off-sets make sense for me but not Canadian industry...get it?
BTW - I'm certain that the Martian Global Warming (hereby knwn as MGW) is due to the Mars rover buggy. I know...I know, it's sloar powered but it's made in America so has just got to be guilty of something
Posted by: Al Gore ||
04/30/2007 17:23 Comments ||
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Mars is being hit by rapid climate change and it is happening so fast that the red planet could lose its southern ice cap, writes Jonathan Leake. Scientists from Nasa say that Mars has warmed by about 0.5C since the 1970s. This is similar to the warming experienced on Earth over approximately the same period.
Since there is no known life on Mars it suggests rapid changes in planetary climates could be natural phenomena. The mechanism at work on Mars appears, however, to be different from that on Earth. One of the researchers, Lori Fenton, believes variations in radiation and temperature across the surface of the Red Planet are generating strong winds.
In a paper published in the journal Nature, she suggests that such winds can stir up giant dust storms, trapping heat and raising the planetÂ’s temperature. FentonÂ’s team unearthed heat maps of the Martian surface from NasaÂ’s Viking mission in the 1970s and compared them with maps gathered more than two decades later by Mars Global Surveyor. They found there had been widespread changes, with some areas becoming darker.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/30/2007 00:00 ||
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At the same time that "Earth's Twin" was discovered = widely reported last week, a large object [IMO estimated size 10-15 miles wide] flew relatively close to Earth, fast enuff to be on fire but "slow" and "low" enuff to see rough rocky dimensions. Over the Guam-WESTPAC region. Reminds me of another "close one" reported by the RUSSIANS ala PRAVDA several yarns back BUT NEVER REPORTED ON US-WESTERN MEDIAS - LEFT A SNAKIN' SMOKE TRAIL THRU EARTH'S LOWER ATMOSPHERE, OVER GUAM'S UNIVERSITY OF GUAM COMPLEX-AREA.
#13
This is actually pretty good news. While Earth heating up maynot be good but all of the major ideas of teraforming Mars has started with melting a good portion of the ice caps to release the oxygen and heat up the planet.
Maybe we should pack up some rockets with algae and send them on thier way to help the process out.
There's no one on Mars to tax or buy my carbon credits!
Posted by: Al Gore ||
04/30/2007 12:03 Comments ||
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While Al Gorilioni is running his eco-religion global warming scam, other more thoughtful people are thinking about solar output cycles, both short term (11 years) and long term (order of 1500 years). In addition I have not seen too much work yet on how the earth's magnetosphere plays into climate change. The magnetosphere decreases, the charge distribution changes on earth. This affects thunderstorms (redistributor of charges), whose associated clouds affect so-called global warming. Also, a decreased magnetosphere will allow more high energy particles to strike Earth.
At any rate, monitoring things on Mars is a good thing, just to allow a bigger picture of the whole thing. If you wish, however, to still purchase indulgences in the form of carbon credits, I, as Rantburg's Resident Imam, will still accept them. It is very easy to do. Just go to the Paypal button on the Burg's main page and click and give to Fred. Nothing to it, and you will feel good after you do it.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/30/2007 17:10 Comments ||
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#16
Maybe we should pack up some rockets with algae and send them on thier way to help the process out.
Include AlGore and you can still note with surety that there's no intelligent life in Mars
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/30/2007 18:48 Comments ||
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It's the damn mars rover I tell ya. Isn't that technically an SUV? Either that or those damn martians not caring about the environment again.
JEDDAH — The Islamic Development Bank (IDB) has approved an allocation of $536,000 as emergency assistance to purchase drugs and medical kits for hospitals in Mogadishu as well as foodstuffs for victims of the current hostilities in Somalia.
Half a million, huh? That's about 2 minutes of income for the Saoodis.
Also, "victims" is defined as "those members of the Islamic Courts who ran out of ammo"
... whole lot of widows needin' ammo, so give generously, Sheikh Mahmoud ...
The bank will dispatch in the next few days a special mission to Mogadishu to supervise the delivery of medical kits and the purchase and distribution of the relief items.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/30/2007 00:00 ||
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The national coordination committee against major corruption and crime is investigating 21 cases of major crimes, said MA Matin, chairman of the committee and adviser for the Ministry of Communications. Three FIRs (first information report) of the cases have been sent to the Anti-Corruption Commission, another three would be sent very soon while the committee is reviewing the rest 15 cases.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/30/2007 00:00 ||
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The caretaker government has sent a set of proposals to the Election Commission (EC) for banning party-affiliated student organisations and trade unions, Law Adviser Mainul Hosein said yesterday.
"I have told the chief election commissioner (CEC) that there should be a law so that no political party can use the teachers and students to its advantage," he said talking to journalists at his secretariat office.
Asked if a draft has been made, he answered in the negative. He said the government believes there should not be party-affiliated student and labour bodies in public or private institutions. "We are not talking about a complete ban on student politics, but we must keep the students out of party politics," Mainul said adding that the political organisations should not have wings in schools, colleges and universities.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/30/2007 00:00 ||
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The Anti-corruption Commission (ACC) yesterday pressed charges against three detained ex-state ministers and two of their family members in connection with three graft cases filed for amassing huge wealth through corruption and abuse of power.
This is the first time the ACC submitted charge sheets against them in connection with graft cases filed with different police stations in March this year. The charge-sheeted accused are former state minister for planning Dr Mohiuddin Khan Alamgir, ex-state minister for civil aviation and tourism Mir Mohammad Nasiruddin, ex-state minister for labour and employment Amanullah Aman, Nasir's son barrister Mir Mohammad Helal Uddin and Aman's wife Sabera Aman.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/30/2007 00:00 ||
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Bangladesh’s High Court refused on Sunday to accept a petition seeking legal immunity for former prime minister Sheikh Hasina. The petition intended to seek an order asking police not to arrest Hasina, who faces charges of murder and extortion, when she returns from London next week. “A high court bench comprising judges SANM Mominur Rahman and M Zubaidur Rahman Chaudhry refused to accept the writ petition because it lacked an affidavit signed by Hasina,” a court registrar said.
The BangladeshÂ’s army-backed interim government last week withdrew a ban on Hasina returning to the country from abroad. A court also suspended an arrest warrant last week issued for her alleged involvement in deaths related to street violence between rival political parties in October. Hasina also faces a charge of extorting some $430,000 from a businessman in 1998. She has rejected both charges.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/30/2007 00:00 ||
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CARACAS, Venezuela - Forcing Big Oil to give up control of Venezuela's most promising oil fields this week will be relatively easy for President Hugo Chavez, but he will face a more delicate challenge in getting the world's top oil companies to stay and keep investing.
If Chavez can persuade companies to stick around despite tougher terms, Venezuela will be on track to develop the planet's largest known oil deposit, possibly to surpass Saudi Arabia as the nation with the most reserves. If he scares them away, the Orinoco River region could end up starved of the investment and know-how needed to transform its vast tar deposits into marketable crude oil.
On Tuesday, BP PLC, ConocoPhillips, Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp., France's Total SA and Norway's Statoil ASA will turn over their Orinoco operations to Venezuela's state oil company, Petroleos de Venezuela SA. Chavez, who says he is reclaiming the oil industry after years of private exploitation, is expected to be accompanied by troops and workers clad in revolutionary red amid fly-bys by the military's new Russian-made fighter jets. "We are going to take over some oil fields that have continued to be in the hands of transnationals," Chavez said in a speech to allied leaders Sunday, calling it "the last step" in recovering state sovereignty over oil.
Culminating a nationalist drive by Chavez that has increasingly squeezed the industry of profits, the two sides are now locked in contentious negotiations: Chavez says PDVSA will take a minimum 60 percent stake in the Orinoco operations, although the companies have been invited to stay as minority partners. They have until June 26 to negotiate the terms, including compensation and reduced stakes. The companies appear to be taking a decisive stand, demanding conditions — and presumably compensation — to convince them that Venezuela will continue to be a good business.
Chevron's future in Venezuela "will very much be dependent on how we're treated in the current negotiation," said David O'Reilly, chief executive of the San Ramon, Calif.-based company. "That process is going to have a direct impact on our appetite going forward."
Irving, Texas-based Exxon Mobil's Rex Tillerson told Dow Jones Newswires and the Wall Street Journal that unless the negotiations produce a profitable proposal, "everything else is moot because we won't be staying. I'm realistic. I've said to them it may not work out," Tillerson said.
Houston-based ConocoPhillips is the only company that has yet to agree in principle to state control, prompting Venezuela to warn it may expropriate its assets. Both sides say talks are ongoing but have declined to give details.
The stakes are high for both sides. Chavez needs the private oil companies' deep pockets and expertise to upgrade the Orinoco's tar-like crude into more marketable oils. While Chavez says state firms from China, India and elsewhere can step in, industry experts doubt they are qualified. Amid the turmoil, new investment from the private companies has already dried up. If any leave, Chavez might be hard-pressed to persuade other big players to take over.
For the companies, pulling out of the Orinoco would be damaging. They have invested more than $17 billion in the projects, now estimated to have grown in worth to some $30 billion. Venezuela has indicated it is inclined the pay the lesser amount — with partial payment in oil, and some suspect, tax forgiveness. The companies have also claimed billions of future barrels of oil from the Orinoco in so-called booked reserves — a critical measure used by investors to value their worth. Smaller stakes will mean taking some of those reserves off the books.
"This is about the last step," says David Mares, a political science professor at the University of California San Diego. Chavez "has been pushing them around and they're pretty much at the brink of what they can accept."
If an agreement is reached, the companies may find it is just the beginning of their headaches. PDVSA has been plagued by accidents and milked for cash by Chavez's government. Questions remain whether it will allow sufficient investment into the projects to maintain production, or also turn them into a cash cow. If accidents occur under PDVSA's management, the private partners also could be liable.
But with private investment barred by state monopolies that control three-quarters of the world's proven reserves, Venezuela may still prove enticing, even under Chavez's terms. "All companies gotta go with where the oil is. And where's the oil in Latin America?" says Ali Moshiri, head of Chevron's Latin American operations.
On Tuesday, BP PLC, ConocoPhillips, Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp., France's Total SA and Norway's Statoil ASA will turn over their Orinoco operations to Venezuela's state oil company, Petroleos de Venezuela SA. Chavez, who says he is reclaiming the oil industry after years of private exploitation, is expected to be accompanied by troops and workers clad in revolutionary red amid fly-bys by the military's new Russian-made fighter jets.
#3
If Chavez expropriates the Oil Companies' assets without fair compensation, tie Hugo up in court everywhere Venezuela tankers go. Kennecott Copper did that years ago when Salvador Allende did that in Chile. Kennecott seized the assets and Allende could not sell copper hardly anywhere. Of course, he later went bump in the night and that was that.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/30/2007 17:25 Comments ||
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Hugo's offering bookvalue take it or leave it, no compensation for loss of future earnings.
#6
That was an amazingly informative, balanced article from AP. Somebody is going to have to get fired for that.
They mention the liability risk if the big oil players retain an interest but not operational control - similar situation still in court in Ecuador regarding former Texaco assets, last I knew (and I don't even think they retained ANY interest, but they still were held liable when successor companies made messes.)
Anyway, these Venezuelan heavy oil projects could become real 'tar babies' (in multiple meanings), where the companies are forced to accept terms that don't make them much, if any, money, but to not accept them risks losing lots of money. Somebody is advising Chavez - I don't think he's that bright.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has said Cuban leader Fidel Castro believes China's market socialism will make it a 21st century's superpower. “Castro wrote me about Mao Zedong and his original vision and wound up saying how China, with its strategy of market socialism, has become a superpower and will become the superpower of the 21st century," AFP quoted Chavez as saying . "The socialism of the 21st century must adapt to conditions of the 21st century," Castro wrote in his nine-page letter to his Venezuelan friend and ally.
Chavez was speaking to reporters as Latin American leaders joined him to talk trade in Barquisimeto, 250 kilometers west of the capital, Caracas. "Fidel is in charge," Chavez said of the 80-year-old Cuban leader, who is recovering from intestinal surgery nine months ago. Castro temporarily handed over the power to his brother, Raul Castro, on July 31.
Meanwhile, Cuban officials say Fidel Castro has returned to perform many of his previous functions, but there is no clear sign yet that Castro would officiate on May Day. The Cuban leader's letter dealt with the thoughts of the founder of Chinese communism, Mao Zedong, and of the Argentine hero of the Cuban revolution, Ernesto Che Guevara.
Castro was conspicuous by his absence at the trade summit, which included leftist presidents Evo Morales of Bolivia, Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua and Rene Preval of Haiti as an observer. The governments of Cuba, Ecuador, Uruguay and Caribbean nations were represented at Chavez's beckoning to discuss his home-grown, Latin American alternative to US-backed free-trade pacts: the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas, which is named for Simon Bolivar, historically the liberator of northern South America from Spain.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/30/2007 00:00 ||
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Lest we fergit, CLINTONISM > "FASCISM", i.e. ULTRA-RIGHTIST SOCIALISM, including SOCIALISM-BASED "CONSERVATISM" + NATIONALISM etal., = the NEW COMMUNISM or LIMITED COMMUNISM. WOT > WAR AGZ FASCISM" = in antithesis WAR FOR COMMUNISM, WAR AGZ NATIONALISM = ditto WAR FOR GLOBALISM, ...etc.
#4
this is a minor statement that admits socialism is a failure, but on the other hand if socialism can include a market economy with socialists making all the decisions, than wow, we've reached a compromise between socialisms reality and that of market economics. In other words socialisms elites will now just be sandwiched in between productive enterprise and take its cut that way. This is truly SOP for all socialists confronted by the reality of failed socialism.
#5
Yes, H8304. It's like a patient always having an IV installed. Just take a pint any time ya like. Just don't take too much or you might kill the patient. It's a nuance thing.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/30/2007 17:38 Comments ||
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Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen (Centre) said on Sunday that dealing with the confusing situation in Estonia is Estonia's own affair, and that outsiders should not interfere in the matter. Foreign Minister Ilkka Kanerva (Nat. Coalition Party) took up the same matter on Sunday in a message to Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the foreign minister of European Union Presidency-holder Germany. Kanerva called solidarity with Estonia, and a common policy line from the European Union.
The reactions came in the wake of unrest in the Estonian capital Tallinn sparked by the removal of a Soviet war memorial from the centre of the city, which has sparked anger among Russians living in the country.
The difference in the tone of the messages caught the attention of observers on Sunday. The emphasis in previous statements is that other countries should not interfere with Estonia's unrest.
Kanerva said in his message that he welcomes the fact that German Chancellor Angela Merkel has been in touch with Estonian Prime Minister Andrus Ansip and Russian President Vladimir Putin to calm the situation down.
Noting that he has followed the situation in Estonia closely, Kanerva emphasised the importance of a common policy line on the part of EU member states - something that is underscored by the present types of circumstances. He added that mutual solidarity is important, and that support is especially important for small member states of the EU. Kanerva expressed confidence that Estonia will be able to handle the situation on its own and to bring the dispute over the war memorial to a conclusion that takes into consideration the feelings of all national groups in the country. He also said that turning this internal affair of Estonia into a dispute between the EU and Russia would not benefit anyone.
Foreign Minister Kanerva told Helsingin Sanomat on Sunday that he sees no conflict between his views and those of Prime Minister Vanhanen. Kanerva said that both he and Vanhanen feel that Estonia has the power and the responsibility to deal with the problems. "The sovereign state must deal with the matter in a way that takes all national groups into consideration", he said. Kanerva and Vanhanen discussed the situation by telephone on Sunday.
Prime Minister Vanhanen noted in his blog that moving statues has not been the Finnish way of doing things. "However, there is no call for brotherly sophistry", he added. "The location of a statue as such cannot be a human rights issue, and the international community cannot have any right to interfere with the matter. This includes neighbouring countries. The moving of the statue and the demonstrations that have resulted from it are an internal affair for Estonia, and no external power has the right to interfere", Vanhanen observed.
Meanwhile, in Tallinn, preparations were being made to move the memorial to its planned new location, a military cemetery. "We want to show as early as possible - possibly already on Monday - that the statue is intact and in good condition", said Estonia's Minister of Defence Jaak Aaviksoo in a press conference on Sunday.
The diplomatic tone of the Defence Minister's speech was in sharp contrast with recent pronouncements by other Estonian politicians. Aaviksoo said that the aim is to have the monument relocated so that a ceremony can be held at the new location on May 8th, when Western countries celebrate the victory over Nazi Germany in the Second World War. Estonia plans to invite representatives of all countries involved in the fight to the ceremony. Russia officially celebrates Victory Day on May 9th.
Estonia's Foreign Minister Urmas Paet recapped the reasons for the relocation of the monument. He said that the most important reason was the symbolic significance for the majority of Estonian residents, for whom it marked the beginning of Soviet occupation and deportations.
He added that the statue had become a gathering place for political provocateurs. Paet also thanked neighbouring countries - Finland, Latvia, and Lithuania - for taking a balanced view of the events. Both Paet and Aaviksoo would not see the dispute as an ethnic conflict. "We have seen riots in Europe and Russia, which were sparked by football games. Tallinn has been spared these, and the police were inexperienced on the first night ... on the second night things were better under control."
Estonian police opened a website containing pictures of the unrest; where members of the public are asked to identify rioters, looters, and men in the background talking into mobile telephones.
Suspicions were voiced among both native Estonians and ethnic Russians in Tallinn, that members of the Russian security service FSB might be involved in the violence. Three Estonian Russian organisations issued a public appeal on Sunday for an end to the violence.
At least 300,000 secular Turks waving the red national flag flooded central Istanbul on Sunday to demand the resignation of the pro-Islamic government. I've seen figures of up to a million people taking part.
I passed by the Turkish Embassy today. Ataturk was standing a little taller.
The second large anti-government demonstration in two weeks followed a sharp rise in tension between Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the country’s powerful pro-secular military, which accuses the government of tolerating the activities of radical Islamic circles. “Turkey is secular and will remain secular,” shouted thousands of flag-waving protesters, who travelled to Istanbul from across the country overnight. The demonstrators sang nationalist songs and demanded the resignation of the government, calling Erdogan a traitor.
“This government is the enemy of Ataturk,” said 63-year-old Ahmet Yurdakul, a retired government employee, invoking the memory of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, who founded the modern republic as a secular nation. “They want to drag Turkey to the dark ages.” The packed meeting area in the Caglayan district was a sea of red, with Turkish flags draped on people like capes and hung from cars, motorcycles and buildings.
Small girls wore red headbands that read “We are following your footsteps,” in reference to Ataturk. Police cordoned off the area and conducted body searches at several entry points. More than 300,000 took part in a similar rally in Ankara two weeks ago.
This one was organised more than a week ago, but it came a day after Erdogan’s government rejected the military’s warning about the country’s disputed presidential election and called it interference that is unacceptable in a democracy. “The roads to Cankaya (the presidential palace) are closed to imams,” the crowd chanted.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/30/2007 00:00 ||
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Has this made any waves in the MSM? I don't get the newspaper anymore and I can't endure TV entertainment news. This is, by any measure, "news", However, I would not even know this was happening unless I read the Internet.
They want to drag the whole world into the dark ages.
This story appeared in our local newspaper this morning. It is indeed interesting news.
Posted by: Al Fraud Gore ||
04/30/2007 9:04 Comments ||
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#3
"ErdoganÂ’s government rejected the militaryÂ’s warning about the countryÂ’s disputed presidential election and called it interference that is unacceptable in a democracy."
If Ergodan steers the Turkish government to Islamism, then Turkey will no longer be a democracy. If that occurs, then the Turkish military should do all it can to restore Ataturk's legacy.
#8
The longer the Turkish Army waits to clean house, the dirtier the house is going to be.
Someone at the Whitehouse might want to send them a similar message. Along with promising significant assistance in cleaning out the radicals. We've got solid experience in Orc COIN now, so Turkey could learn a lot.
Mike N.
Posted by: Cloger Scourge of the Poles9958 ||
04/30/2007 20:25 Comments ||
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TORONTO - Al Gore condemned Canada's plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, saying it was a fraud "designed to mislead the Canadian people." Nobody consulted me, the Czar of Greenhouse Gas Emissions! There is no provision for buying my Carbon Credits!
Under the initiative announced Thursday, Canada would reduce greenhouse gas emissions 20 percent by 2020. But the government acknowledged it would not meet its obligations under the Kyoto Protocol, which requires 35 industrialized countries to cut greenhouse-gas emissions by 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2012. The country's emissions are now 30 percent above 1990 levels. LOL! 30% ABOVE 1990 levels! Does any intelligent person not now realize this was complete bull$hit from the beginning? so much for "Feel Good" agreements.
The Conservative government's strategy focuses both on reducing emissions of gases blamed for global warming and improving air quality. But the plan failed to spell out what many of its regulations will look like. We're gonna reduce them emissions, we're not sure how but, by gum, we're gonna do it!
"In my opinion, it is a complete and total fraud," Gore said Saturday. "It is designed to mislead the Canadian people." Howlin' Al knows all about misleading the people. He's a master at it.
Gore said he was surprised that the plan focused on reducing the intensity of emissions rather than tough, overall curbs. Turn out those lights! Stop heating your homes! Buy my Carbon Credits! I can't support my high-energy lifestyle unless more of you Morons buy them!
He said "intensity reduction" - which allows industries to increase their greenhouse gas outputs as they raise production - was a poll-tested phrase developed by think tanks financed by Exxon Mobil and other large polluters. Gore says therfore it is Truth! The Goracle has spoken!
Canadian Environment Minister John Baird rejected Gore's criticisms. "The fact is our plan is vastly tougher than any measures introduced by the administration of which the former vice president was a member," Baird said in a statement. Neener-neener!
Baird also invited Gore to discuss climate change and the Conservatives' environmental policies with him.
Gore, who was in Toronto to present his documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth," at a consumer environmental show, acknowledged that as an American, he had "no right to interfere" in Canadian decision. Then keep yer yap shut, Bugwit!
"As my good friend Maurice Strong was telling me just the other day..."
However, he said, the rest of the world looks to Canada for moral leadership, and that was why Thursday's announcement was so "shocking." If the rest of the World looks to Canada for moral leadership the rest of the World is Morally Bankrupt.
Canadian opposition Liberal Leader Stephane Dion said Sunday that Gore was right. "Mr. Baird is embarrassing Canada around the world," Dion said. "The world expects Canada will do its share - more than that, that Canada will be a leader and we are failing the world. We are failing Canadians." I think it's the other way around, Darlin'. Socialism will not supply your people with everything they need. Your brain and a bucket of hair seem to have a lot in common.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
04/30/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
Canada leads the world by a long way in both per capita energy consumption and the energy intensity of its industry (energy consumed per unit of GDP), probably because it's so frickin cold.
#2
Global warming is a Canadian plot to get decent weather.
Posted by: Baba Tutu ||
04/30/2007 2:40 Comments ||
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#3
The Great Green House Gas Fraud
If I had a gas guzzling SUV, I'd put a bumper sticker on it that says (something like): It's Ok that I get 5MPG - I planted some trees and only use one squre of toilet paper.
That's a bit long maybe I'd go with - This SUV is a carbon offset for Al Gore's Lear jet.
#4
I hope this demented crank runs for President. Better yet, run as the Green Party candidate.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
04/30/2007 6:14 Comments ||
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PB: Canada leads the world by a long way in both per capita energy consumption and the energy intensity of its industry (energy consumed per unit of GDP), probably because it's so frickin cold.
I tend to think that the cold builds character. All environment-loving Canucks should therefore turn the thermostat down to a toasty 50 degrees Fahrenheit during the winter.
#6
Kyoto is a joke. If the Euros and Greenies were really serious, then they would would insist on using 1945 as the basis year. Nobody in Europe was complaining that Jan. 1945 was too hot. Best of all, the Germans can then live as Joseph Stalin intended for them, tending garden plots and burning dung for warmth. As a bonus, Canadians would again have a world class military.
Posted by: ed ||
04/30/2007 8:53 Comments ||
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#7
I know fraud when I see it.
Posted by: Al Fraud Gore ||
04/30/2007 8:58 Comments ||
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#8
Germans can then live as Joseph Stalin intended for them, tending garden plots and burning dung for warmth.
Funny, one thing that stands out while biking all over the German countryside: the year-round buzz of chainsaws in the forest and endless cords of firewood stacked everywhere. I'm sure it's not intended as a rebellion against the global enviro-fascists, but I'd bet Fritz and Karl-Heinz couldn't care less about offsetting their particulate and livestock emissions.
#9
If I recall correctly, exJAG, the German forests are under severe stress, due to acid rain and suchlike. I think it's in the Black Forest that larges swathes are almost entirely standing dead trees, the still living riddled with disease and insects. Good forestry practices would call for such to be cut down and disposed of, before it all catches fire from a stray lighting bolt... and contributes greatly to global warming. Perhaps that's what you're seeing.
#14
I think it's the Floridians. They are tired of Northern retires coming South. Besides, think of all the new beach-fron property in Canada. And all the beautiful Canadian women that will be able to wear Bikinis. Those wiley Canadians.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
04/30/2007 14:37 Comments ||
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#15
How much CO2 do all those Zambonis generate? That could lead to the end of Canada as we know it!
Posted by: Dar ||
04/30/2007 15:13 Comments ||
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#16
I picked up $35,000,000.00 in Carbon Offsets. You can, too, but you better hurry. (Follow the link)
#17
TW, I'm sure that goes on, but the huge logs stacked up and waiting for transport all along forest trails (pulverized to foot-thick mud by heavy haulers every spring and fall) look and smell as healthy and alive as could be.
Pakistan's cricket coach Bob Woolmer, who died of strangulation earlier this year, was also poisoned, a BBC investigation has learned. The gun shots might have contributed something, too...
The results of toxicology tests mean it now seems certain the ex-England player was rendered helpless before being strangled, the Panorama programme says. After which he was apparently flung from a 21st story window...
Which is an odd thing in itself as the hotel has only eighteen stories...
On 20 April the inquest into the death was postponed because the coroner was advised there had been "recent and significant developments". Caught the driver of the truck that ran him over, did they?
Now a Panorama investigation has learned that a toxicology report on Woolmer's body shows that there was a drug in his body that would have incapacitated him. They've found the puncture wound from the dart. Now, if they can just tie it to the blowgun...
The final results of the report are due to be lost by given to Jamaican police next week. "Those tests will show there was a drug in his system that would have incapacitated Mr Woolmer," Panorama's Adam Parsons says. "The specific details of that poison are now very likely to offer a significant lead to finding his murderer." "It's iocaine powder! I'd bet my life on it!"
The policeman leading the murder investigation, Mark Shields, told Panorama that it is "difficult and it's rare" for one man to strangle another. "A lot of force would be needed to do that. Bob Woolmer was a large man and that's why one could argue that it was an extremely strong person or maybe more than one person. But equally the lack of external injuries suggests that there might be some other factors and that's what we're looking into at the moment." "One theory is that the knife between his shoulder blades might have been related to his demise. Now, if we could just figure how...!"
#5
You know, I think they may be onto something. A professional athlete, even a retired one, would be the last person I'd try to throttle to death by myself.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/30/2007 12:43 Comments ||
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#7
A South African coach murdered in Jamaica, located between Venezuela, and Cuba, angry extremist Pakistani cricket players, rumors of a nefarious gambling ring and threats to the family, and a radical Jamaican Muslim convert just charged with terrorism in London...it's an intriguing plot line worthy of an Agatha Christie novel. PBS won't pick it up, as they have refused to even show the new documentary on Islamists.
#8
You know, I think they may be onto something.
bigjim-
I agree. Early reports had blood, feces, and vomit splattered fairly high up on the wall, if I recall, and I thought it sounded like a brutal beating from someone quite large. Strangulation is anticlimatic and maybe to hasten death so the perp could flee.
THE United States' leading hurricane forecaster says global ocean currents, not human-produced carbon dioxide, are responsible for global warming.
William Gray, a Colorado State University researcher, also said the Earth may begin to cool on its own in five to 10 years.
Speaking to a group of Republican MPs, Dr Gray had harsh words for researchers and politicians who said man-made greenhouse gases were responsible for global warming.
"They are blaming it all on humans, which is crazy," he said.
"We're not the cause of it."
Dr Gray said in the past 40 years the number of serious hurricanes making landfall on the US Atlantic coast had declined even though carbon dioxide levels had risen.
He said increasing levels of carbon dioxide would not produce more, or stronger, hurricanes.
Dr Gray, 77, has long criticised the theory that heat-trapping gases generated by human activity are causing the world to warm.
Earlier this month, he dubbed former US vice-president and 2000 Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore "a gross alarmist" for making the Oscar-winning documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, which helped focus media attention on global warming.
Yesterday, Dr Gray said that politics and research into global warming had created "almost an industry" that had frightened the public and overwhelmed dissenting voices.
He said research arguing that humans were causing global warming was "mush" based on unreliable computer models that could not possibly take into account the hundreds of factors that influenced the weather.
He said little-understood ocean currents were behind a decades-long warming cycle, and disputed assertions that greenhouse gases could raise global temperatures as much as some scientists predicted.
"There's no way that doubling CO2 is going to cause that amount of warming," he said.
Dr Gray also said warming and cooling trends could not go on indefinitely and believed temperatures were beginning to level out after a very warm year in 1998.
#1
The ocean was a full 2 degrees warmer than normal prior to Katrina and there was a lot of geothermal heat released during an earthquake through underocean faults and vents. Global warming is an act of God, not man-made, although I am a recycler and prefer clean drinking water.
With the world's eyes focused on its nuclear program, economists and lawmakers have sounded alarm bells over inflation in Iran after a conspicuous surge in prices in recent months. A combination of expansionary economic policies, US pressure on the Iranian banking system and high money supply growth is fueling price rises in staple goods in the Islamic Republic and hitting the lowest classes hardest.
The research center run by the conservative-dominated Parliament announced last week that inflation reached 22.4 percent in the last Iranian year that ended on March 20, well above the official estimate of 13.5 percent.
A group of 20 lawmakers then published an open statement protesting against the "uncontrolled and unwarranted rise in prices of foodstuffs, hygiene products and consumer goods." "Officials have to do something against unemployment and the unbridled rise in prices as a matter of urgency," said one MP, Asghar Gheranmayeh.
According to Parliament's research center, the price rises look set to continue in the current Iranian year, with inflation set to hit 24 percent. Money supply growth - a key indication of future price trends - is seen at a colossal 42 percent. "There is no control on prices. Beauty products are up by 35 percent wholesale. The price of cooking oils has also gone up by 35 percent," said one shopkeeper who declined to be identified.
Retailers used the recent New Year holiday period to raise their prices when people returned from the break, with the price of fruit going up by 21.6 percent in the space of a week. "A big bottle of Coke has climbed to 7,500 rials from 6,000 and the orange juice that I buy has doubled in price. My hairdresser has also raised his prices by 40 percent," complained one Iranian consumer.
The central bank has also issued a new high-denomination 50,000 rial note (about $5) in a move that appears linked to the rising prices, although the authorities deny any connection with inflation.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/30/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
I wouldn't mind inflation so much but why does it have to hit right now, when prices are so high?
Tehran's barbers are to stop offering Iranian men unconventional Western hairstyles amid a nationwide crackdown on dressing deemed to be un-Islamic, the Etemad newspaper reported on Sunday. The paper quoted the head of the Tehran barbers' association as saying police had issued a directive forbidding its members from giving men offbeat hairstyles that are all the rage in more affluent parts of the capital. "Currently some salons use Western grooming methods to create styles that are in line with the European and American ones," said the association's head, Mohammad Eftekhari-Fard. "The union has repeatedly announced the restrictions against unconventional grooming when issuing permits to each of the barber shops. Hence barbers, knowing these rules, should not pursue the wrong methods," he warned. "The union will withdraw its support from those barbers who cut hairstyles that are out of line with the norms of the system," he said. Conservatives in Iran have long been upset by the heavy use of styling gel, shoulder-length hair and the spiky "big hair" styles sported by some of Tehran's young males. The directive also banned the use of "facial cosmetics, plucking of eyebrows and applying special make-up in male salons," he said. Customers would also not be allowed to wear ties and bow-ties in barber shops, he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/30/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
All it took was one visit by Don King and Al Sharpton ...
#2
Tehran's Quaranic fanatics, those still refusing to wear Western neck ties, while not ostracizing Shi'ite head-wear having the appearance of used diapers, well, they are on the 'Islamic fashion' rampage again. This time it's 'offbeat haircuts?
#4
Storm the palace, kill all the assholes, hunt down all the MM's like dogs. While you still have the strength to do so, before they start starving you into submission.
Nice piece in the LA Times on Frank Miller, author of the 300, Sin City and The Dark Night Returns. Not a conservative, not a liberal, but he understands the fight we're in today. Money quote:
"What people are not dealing with is the fact that we're going up against a culture that finds it acceptable to do things that the rest of the world left behind with the barbarians in the 6th century," Miller said. "I'm a little tired of people worrying about being polite. We are fighting in the face of fascists."
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/30/2007 00:00 ||
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I recently noticed that Miller acknowledges the writings of Victor Davis Hanson in the reference list for 300 (the book).
#4
This War is the seminal issue of our time and we should elect a US President based on how he/she outlines how the war will be waged. The rest is simply white noise.
#6
Batman's Ra's al-Ghul was the perfect cross between an eco-nut socialist and a Salafist fanatic. He mostly wanted to wipe out most of humanity to restore nature to pristine desert.
He was an Earth First! Wahabbi with a cape and goatee.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
JEDDAH — The Islamic Development Bank (IDB) has approved an allocation of $536,000 as emergency assistance to purchase drugs and medical kits for hospitals in Mogadishu as well as foodstuffs for victims of the current hostilities in Somalia.
Bangladesh’s High Court refused on Sunday to accept a petition seeking legal immunity for former prime minister Sheikh Hasina. The petition intended to seek an order asking police not to arrest Hasina, who faces charges of murder and extortion, when she returns from London next week. “A high court bench comprising judges SANM Mominur Rahman and M Zubaidur Rahman Chaudhry refused to accept the writ petition because it lacked an affidavit signed by Hasina,” a court registrar said.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has said Cuban leader Fidel Castro believes China's market socialism will make it a 21st century's superpower. “Castro wrote me about Mao Zedong and his original vision and wound up saying how China, with its strategy of market socialism, has become a superpower and will become the superpower of the 21st century," AFP quoted Chavez as saying . "The socialism of the 21st century must adapt to conditions of the 21st century," Castro wrote in his nine-page letter to his Venezuelan friend and ally. 
TORONTO - Al Gore condemned Canada's plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, saying it was a fraud "designed to mislead the Canadian people."
Pakistan's cricket coach Bob Woolmer, who died of strangulation earlier this year, was also poisoned, a BBC investigation has learned. 
Tehran's barbers are to stop offering Iranian men unconventional Western hairstyles amid a nationwide crackdown on dressing deemed to be un-Islamic, the Etemad newspaper reported on Sunday. The paper quoted the head of the Tehran barbers' association as saying police had issued a directive forbidding its members from giving men offbeat hairstyles that are all the rage in more affluent parts of the capital. "Currently some salons use Western grooming methods to create styles that are in line with the European and American ones," said the association's head, Mohammad Eftekhari-Fard. "The union has repeatedly announced the restrictions against unconventional grooming when issuing permits to each of the barber shops. Hence barbers, knowing these rules, should not pursue the wrong methods," he warned. "The union will withdraw its support from those barbers who cut hairstyles that are out of line with the norms of the system," he said. Conservatives in Iran have long been upset by the heavy use of styling gel, shoulder-length hair and the spiky "big hair" styles sported by some of Tehran's young males. The directive also banned the use of "facial cosmetics, plucking of eyebrows and applying special make-up in male salons," he said. Customers would also not be allowed to wear ties and bow-ties in barber shops, he said.
