Hi there, !
Today Thu 11/22/2007 Wed 11/21/2007 Tue 11/20/2007 Mon 11/19/2007 Sun 11/18/2007 Sat 11/17/2007 Fri 11/16/2007 Archives
Rantburg
533594 articles and 1861713 comments are archived on Rantburg.

Today: 89 articles and 340 comments as of 14:30.
Post a news link    Post your own article   
Area: WoT Operations    WoT Background    Opinion    Local News       
Israel agrees to return 20,000 Palestinian refugees
Today's Headlines
Headline Comments [Views]
Page 3: Non-WoT
3 00:00 Zenster [4] 
11 00:00 DMFD [8] 
1 00:00 swksvolFF [6] 
5 00:00 trailing wife [7] 
2 00:00 Abu do you love [7] 
0 [7] 
5 00:00 ed [6] 
3 00:00 Grumenk Philalzabod0723 [5] 
13 00:00 WTF [8] 
0 [6] 
1 00:00 Glenmore [4] 
6 00:00 trailing wife [3] 
1 00:00 Zenster [4] 
0 [4] 
6 00:00 lotp [3] 
Page 1: WoT Operations
0 [9]
1 00:00 trailing wife [7]
1 00:00 M. Murcek [6]
0 [6]
3 00:00 JohnQC [7]
13 00:00 Skidmark [6]
11 00:00 anymouse [8]
5 00:00 crosspatch [6]
0 [7]
2 00:00 crosspatch [8]
0 [8]
0 [7]
2 00:00 ed [5]
12 00:00 Grumenk Philalzabod0723 [8]
1 00:00 gorb [4]
2 00:00 Steve [7]
2 00:00 JosephMendiola [6]
1 00:00 trailing wife [3]
0 [4]
0 [4]
1 00:00 Abu do you love [4]
0 [4]
Page 2: WoT Background
8 00:00 Verlaine [11]
2 00:00 Excalibur [4]
6 00:00 JosephMendiola [11]
12 00:00 Zenster [8]
1 00:00 danking70 [6]
2 00:00 JosephMendiola [9]
7 00:00 McZoid [5]
9 00:00 JosephMendiola [5]
7 00:00 lotp [5]
1 00:00 ed [3]
1 00:00 Procopius2k [4]
8 00:00 Glusomp Grundy1452 [3]
4 00:00 JosephMendiola [6]
0 [5]
5 00:00 JosephMendiola [10]
11 00:00 Zenster [6]
2 00:00 The Democrats [5]
0 [8]
1 00:00 Seafarious [5]
0 [8]
0 [7]
7 00:00 eLarson [8]
0 [6]
0 [7]
0 [7]
1 00:00 gorb [7]
0 [8]
4 00:00 Grumenk Philalzabod0723 [5]
0 [5]
14 00:00 ed [6]
Page 4: Opinion
1 00:00 Procopius2k [3]
3 00:00 JosephMendiola [6]
0 [5]
5 00:00 Nimble Spemble [4]
0 [3]
0 [7]
1 00:00 JosephMendiola [6]
0 [5]
8 00:00 Fred [5]
4 00:00 Zenster [5]
15 00:00 lotp [6]
5 00:00 JosephMendiola [4]
Page 5: Russia-Former Soviet Union
2 00:00 ed [3]
9 00:00 Jack the Rat [6]
15 00:00 Eric Jablow [6]
5 00:00 M. Murcek [6]
1 00:00 phil_b [3]
7 00:00 Barbara Skolaut [7]
6 00:00 Zenster [7]
17 00:00 lotp [3]
0 [4]
9 00:00 Eric Jablow [9]
-Signs, Portents, and the Weather-
Bangladesh storm toll exceeds 3,000
Posted by: Fred || 11/19/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [4 views] Top|| File under:

#1  NPR covered this story on my drive home this afternoon. Mentioned that naval vessels and helicopters were involved in rescue and assistance operations, but did not include whose navy the vessels belonged to - presumably not Bangladesh's.
Posted by: Glenmore || 11/19/2007 19:28 Comments || Top||


Bangla: Red Crescent fears toll may top 10,000
Crisis of drinking water; relief inadequate; diarrhoea, hunger spread
Posted by: Fred || 11/19/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [3 views] Top|| File under:

#1  It sucks when you whole country is a river delta.
Posted by: 3dc || 11/19/2007 8:45 Comments || Top||

#2  The Banglas are doing much better than they have historically due to better organization and weather forecasting. Some death tolls from similar cyclones:
1997: killed 150,000
1991: killed 140,000
1970: killed 500,000
Posted by: ed || 11/19/2007 8:56 Comments || Top||

#3  It sucks when your whole country worships allan.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 11/19/2007 9:01 Comments || Top||

#4  Time to make even another dime of disaster relief or financial aid contingent upon removing Islam as their state religion and prohibiting shari'a law. Until then, they can drown in their own diarrhea for all I care.
Posted by: Zenster || 11/19/2007 10:31 Comments || Top||

#5  inshalla!
Posted by: jds || 11/19/2007 16:47 Comments || Top||

#6  The same US carrier that did so much good in Indonesia after the tsunami is steaming toward Bangladesh with clean water, plastic sheeting for shelters, and hygiene kits.
Posted by: trailing wife || 11/19/2007 19:28 Comments || Top||


Africa Subsaharan
Zim 'ready for UK invasion'
The Zimbabwean government has accused the UK of plotting an invasion and considering assassinations of the country's political leadership. Presidential spokesman George Charamba said Harare remained ready to defend itself against the "sinister threats".

He was responding to comments by a former British general Lord Guthrie in a UK newspaper a week ago. Lord Guthrie recalled advising the ex-Prime Minister Tony Blair against invading Zimbabwe.

Zimbabwe has often accused its former colonial ruler of attempts to interfere in its internal affairs, in part out of concern for white farmers - many of British origin - whose farms have been seized and redistributed. But the UK accuses the government of President Robert Mugabe of gross human rights violations and of creating a "tragedy" in Zimbabwe.

Invasion considered
In a frank interview with the UK's Independent on Sunday on 11 November, Lord Guthrie told the newspaper he had had a close relationship with Mr Blair. "We used to talk about things," he said. "I could say anything to him because he knew I wasn't going to spill the beans."

Among the subjects they discussed, the newspaper reported, was an invasion of Zimbabwe, "which people were always trying to get me to look at. My advice was, 'Hold hard, you'll make it worse.'"

In his comments on Sunday, Mr Charamba told the official Sunday Mail newspaper that the Zimbabwean leadership had been aware of a threat of invasion. "The government was aware of the plans and the president made reference to the sinister [British] motives on several occasions," he was quoted as saying. "A defence plan had been operationalised and in fact, it is still in operation. We were also aware that short of a fully-fledged invasion, the British were and are still contemplating the elimination of our political leadership through a number of assassinations," said Mr Charamba.
Posted by: Fred || 11/19/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [8 views] Top|| File under:

#1  he told the reporter "We used to talk about things," he said. "I could say anything to him because he knew I wasn't going to spill the beans"


who said irony was dead?
Posted by: Frank G || 11/19/2007 6:00 Comments || Top||

#2  I don't think Bob has much to worry about given the state of Britain's military. More's the pity.
Posted by: Spot || 11/19/2007 8:19 Comments || Top||

#3  The Queen's Royal Mess Cooks could land with a pound of sausage and rally 90% of the population to their side.
Posted by: ed || 11/19/2007 8:23 Comments || Top||

#4  He needs an invasion to save himself from the soon to be mobs of starving right out of a zombie movie.
Posted by: 3dc || 11/19/2007 8:44 Comments || Top||

#5  Make some more veiled threats. Keeps him jumpy.
Posted by: McZoid || 11/19/2007 9:02 Comments || Top||

#6  Send in a SAS team every 30 days or so to blow up some target picked at random. It can even be a banana seller's shack. That would really play with his mind.
Posted by: DarthVader || 11/19/2007 9:37 Comments || Top||

#7  A pound of Zimbab sausage?
Posted by: Canuckistan || 11/19/2007 14:29 Comments || Top||

#8  Ya wouldn't wanna spill the beans over there. They go for about a million a can...
Posted by: tu3031 || 11/19/2007 14:33 Comments || Top||

#9  One shot is what it's all about.
Posted by: Michael Vronsky || 11/19/2007 14:37 Comments || Top||

#10  The Brits wouldn't invade Zimbabwe!


They'd invade Rhodesia.
Posted by: mojo || 11/19/2007 14:38 Comments || Top||

#11  Why would the Brits invade Zim-bob-land?

Are starving people a natural resource which they covet?
Posted by: Grumenk Philalzabod0723 || 11/19/2007 22:30 Comments || Top||

#12  He's really desperate for a diversion, any diversion.

I wouldn't take the whole nation as a free gift, including Zim Bob's head as a bonus.
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 11/19/2007 23:09 Comments || Top||

#13  Take my country - please!

/Henny Youngman
Posted by: WTF || 11/19/2007 23:53 Comments || Top||


Rules, lines for food grow longer as hard times strike Zimbabwe
Posted by: Fred || 11/19/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [6 views] Top|| File under:


Arabia
Yemen: Food Protest Biggest Since Revolution
TAIZ, Nov. 14 - Thousands of citizens gathered at premises of the local authority of Taiz governorate in the biggest protest ever seen in Yemen since the popular revolution against the British Occupation. Despite the government’s efforts to tighten the noose around protests and demonstrations by taking heightened security measures throughout Taiz city, thousands of citizens reached the rally scene and raised slogans similar to the ones recently seen in the southern and eastern governorates.
I don't know much about Yemen, but it is obvious that the Islamist government prefers to feed the people Koran phraseology rather than real sustenance. You can bamboozle the people only so far, said the Wizard of Id.
The angry demonstrators raised slogans pressing the government to improve their living standards, eradicate corruption and enhance the principle of equal citizenship and distribute service and development projects fairly to different parts of the nation.

By the end of the demonstration, participants circulated a statement confirming they streamed into streets because the government refused to meet their demands and continued its arbitrary practices against civil community organizations and unions that voice people’s concerns via peaceful means.

The statement demanded the government to create more job opportunities to the idle youth and called on the youth to express solidarity with the journalistic activist Tawakul Karaman, Chairwoman of Women Journalists Without Chains. The protestors strongly denounced all the arbitrary practices and attacks against great politicians and journalists.

“Taiz, once the city of culture and trade, has turned into a venue for poverty and unemployment,” the statement commented, claiming the government to have a merciful look at the governorate, which is known for its great scientific and cultural status, as well as being the most populous governorate in the country. According to the statement, Taiz locals, who played an important role in the outbreak of 26 September and 14 October revolutions, are entitled to enjoy equal rights in terms of obtaining government jobs in order to sustain their families and lead a stable life.
Posted by: McZoid || 11/19/2007 00:04 || Comments || Link || [7 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Yemen along with a majority of other MME (Muslim Middle East) nations all face a severe shortage of irrigation resources in general and drinking water specifically. This is known as "water poverty". The upshot of this is that—as their populations continue to expand unchecked—any available water supplies are dwindling at an inversely proportionate rate.

What much of the hostile and aggressive Islamic nations will soon need to confront is that the Western countries—the ones that that they so often allow their citizens to commit terrorist atrocities against—may soon stop shipping them the grain that they are rapidly becoming totally dependent upon as they divert all available hydrological resources to potable water supplies.

Desalination is so prohibitively expensive—especially in the midst of such traditional kleptocracies—that thwarting Islamic aggression may soon prove to be so simple as just stopping all food shipments to these Islamic utopias sere terrorist hellholes. I say, let them eat sand and drink oil.
Posted by: Zenster || 11/19/2007 1:49 Comments || Top||

#2  Water shortages/ food shortages can also be related to qat. This shrub uses a ton of water and land to grow...everyone in Yemen chews it and it is a huge part of the economy and culture.
Posted by: Beagle2 || 11/19/2007 6:19 Comments || Top||

#3  Another future recipient of the US Meals on Wheels program.
Posted by: ed || 11/19/2007 8:20 Comments || Top||

#4  In the early 6th Century, Yemen was a major regional power. They had built the Marib Dam, which was then the biggest known. However, Yemen collapsed after the dam burst in about 520 AD. There is a reference to that in the Koran. After Muhammed's (camel fleas be upon him) death, his successors invaded Yemen after they declared their own phony "prophet." If that dam hadn't collapsed, then the Hijaz Arabs would have been in no position to attack. History is a funny game.

Supposedly, the Queen of Sheba was a Yemeni.
Posted by: McZoid || 11/19/2007 9:00 Comments || Top||

#5  The Ethiopians claim the Queen of Sheba, too, for what it's worth. And, the Ethiopian emperors claimed direct line of descent from the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon.
Posted by: trailing wife || 11/19/2007 19:49 Comments || Top||


Saudis look to invest in Asian oil refineries
Posted by: lotp || 11/19/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [7 views] Top|| File under:


Bangladesh
Bangla: Over $25m pledged in international help
Donor nations and agencies have pledged over US$ 25 million in assistance to help Bangladesh meet the requirements rising in the aftermath of Cyclone Sidr. This assurance for help has come before the government has made any formal appeal for international assistance. The donor nations and agencies have also made further commitments to provide short and long term assistance to cyclone victims.
Posted by: Fred || 11/19/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [4 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Isn't it about time to withhold all foreign aid and even disaster relief to nations that have even a whiff of shari'a law in place? Such assistance represents nothing less than abetting further and significant abuse of human rights. Better that droves die of relatively self-imposed privations than further enable the detestable crimes against humanity routinely committed in the name of shari'a.
Posted by: Zenster || 11/19/2007 0:43 Comments || Top||


Khoka among 11 graft suspects asked to submit wealth report
The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) yesterday issued notices to 11 graft suspects including City Mayor Sadeque Hossain Khoka, ordering them to submit wealth statement.

The 11 are among the 35 suspects who make up the commission's fourth list published on October 4. Besides Khoka, Awami League (AL) presidium member Tofail Ahmed, former BNP state minister Maj (retd) Kamrul Islam, AL presidium member Syeda Sajeda Chowdhury, former finance minister M Saifur Rahman's son Shafiur Rahman Babu, former AL lawmaker AKM Rahmat Ullah, former adviser to a caretaker government Justice M Fazlul Huq, former chairman of BRTC Taimur Alam Khandaker, former premier Khaleda Zia's APS (1) deputy secretary Shamsul Alam, ex-communications secretary Rezaul Hayat, and Rajuk CBA President and building inspector Amir Khasru were served notices.
Posted by: Fred || 11/19/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [4 views] Top|| File under:


Minu sued for hiding wealth
The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) in Rajshahi yesterday sued Rajshahi City Corporation Mayor Mizanur Rahman Minu and his wife Salma Shahadat for illegally accumulating wealth worth over Tk 3 crore and concealing information on their wealth statements.

In Dhaka, the ACC pressed charges against former Awami League (AL) lawmaker Dr HBM Iqbal, four of his family members and detained former BNP lawmaker M Naser Rahman and his wife in connection with graft cases filed for concealing wealth in their statements.

Meanwhile, the hearing on the seven-day remand prayer to interrogate Tarique Rahman, detained senior joint secretary general of BNP, in connection with a case filed for extorting Tk 81 lakh from a businessman, is scheduled for today in his presence.
Posted by: Fred || 11/19/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [3 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "Minu the Merciless"?
Posted by: mojo || 11/19/2007 12:19 Comments || Top||

#2  1 crore = what in terms I understand?
Posted by: 3dc || 11/19/2007 21:59 Comments || Top||

#3  1 crore = 1 million (usually Rupees)
Posted by: Mullah Richard || 11/19/2007 22:10 Comments || Top||

#4  REVISED

1 crore = 10 million (usually Rupees)
Posted by: Mullah Richard || 11/19/2007 22:11 Comments || Top||

#5  1 crore = 10 million Pakistani rupees = $163,347 or so at the moment.

But I don't know what the 'TK 3' means.

A lakh = 100,000 Pakistani rupees = $1,633.
Posted by: lotp || 11/19/2007 22:12 Comments || Top||

#6  Duh. The 'Tk' means the Taka, the Bangladesh currency. 1 Tk crore = 10,000,000 taka = $146,145 at today's rate.
Posted by: lotp || 11/19/2007 22:19 Comments || Top||


Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia
Kazakhstan in nuclear deal with Beijing
Kazakhstan has agreed to share its uranium resources with China in exchange for equity in Chinese nuclear power facilities in a strategic deal that brings together the world’s fastest growing uranium and nuclear electricity producers.

Moukhtar Dzhakishev, the president of Kazatomprom, Kazakhstan’s state-owned nuclear power company, said: “We will swap shares in uranium production for shares in Chinese atomic facilities ... This is the first time China has allowed any foreign company to become a shareholder in its atomic power industry enterprises.”

China National Nuclear Corp and China Nuclear Guangdong Power Corp, China’s leading nuclear power companies, would team up to take a 49 per cent stake in a uranium mining venture in Kazakhstan with Kazatomprom retaining a 51 per cent stake, Mr Dzhakishev said. In exchange, Kazatomprom would take equity in Chinese nuclear fuel processing or electricity generation plants.

Details of an agreement signed by the Chinese government are expected to be finalised by next month.

The deal, a breakthrough for the secretive Chinese nuclear industry, highlights China’s aggressive campaign to secure energy resources in central Asia.

China agreed this year to help build an oil pipeline linking Kazakhstan’s oil-rich Caspian region with northwest China and a natural gas pipeline from Turkmenistan across Kazakhstan to Shanghai.

Beijing plans to build 40 new nuclear power plants by 2020 to reduce dependence on polluting coal-fired electricity generation. But its uranium reserves, including mines in Xinjiang province near the Kazakh frontier, are declining.

Meanwhile, Kazakhstan plans to more than double its uranium output by 2010, overtaking Canada and Australia to become the world’s biggest producer.

Uranium prices have surged in the past three years spurred by a worldwide revival in interest in nuclear power as an alternative to high-cost oil.

Foreign companies including Areva of France, Canada’s Cameco and Japan’s Sumitomo have entered uranium mining joint ventures with Kazatomprom.

Kazatomprom operates a huge, Soviet-built nuclear fuel pellet plant in north Kazakhstan, but wants to develop more advanced nuclear fuel assembly technology to add value to its uranium business. The company expects eventually to capture about a third of world demand for nuclear reactor fuel.

Kazatomprom bought a 10 per cent stake in Westinghouse, the US nuclear technology company, from Toshiba for $540m (€370m, £265m) this year. The partnership mirrors the Chinese deal, by providing Westinghouse with a guaranteed source of uranium and Kazatomprom with access to fuel processing know-how and technology.

Mr Dzhakishev said Kazatomprom’s deal with China was “exclusive”.

China was attracted by the proximity of Kazakh uranium mines. Kazakhstan’s “non-super power status” was another advantage, with the republic able to maintain a distance from any international controversy about the politically sensitive nuclear industry.

Kazakhstan was a big nuclear weapons producer in the Soviet era, but surrendered its warheads after independence in 1991.
Posted by: lotp || 11/19/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [7 views] Top|| File under:

#1  While China locks up up energy and raw materials supplies Kazakstan, Australia, Africa, Middle East and South America with dollars earned from non-tariffed exports to America, our leaders are busy selling off our nuclear industry and locking up domestic resources into no-go zones. Our leadership, both business and government, have devolved into stupid, greedy, short sighted, F'ing dinosaurs.
Posted by: ed || 11/19/2007 9:14 Comments || Top||

#2  Bingo ed..

China's leadership is looking to the next century while the US leadership is only interested in the next election cycle.

VERY short sighted.
Posted by: Abu do you love || 11/19/2007 14:33 Comments || Top||


Europe
German police to demonstrate against open Polish border
German border police, who are to demonstrate this week against the opening of the Polish and Czech borders, were accused Sunday of alarmism. Joerg Schoenbohm, interior minister of one of the German border states, Brandenburg, said there was no evidence there would be an invasion of criminals and terrorists when border checks cease on December 21. He told the news magazine Focus that allegations to this effect by unions representing federal border police were "irresponsible alarmism" and a "perfidious" libel against Poland.

"It ignores the huge efforts that our neighbours have made to get ready," said Schoenbohm, a former army general who is one of Germany's leading law-and-order campaigners.

But Michael Peckmann, a police union spokesman, said Sunday, "We do expect crime to wash over into Germany. It is far too early to just withdraw the federal border police. They should first wait and see what happens."

Thousands of police who fear for their jobs are expected to demonstrate on Thursday in the city of Frankfurt-an-der-Oder on the Polish border. The border is to become an open frontier under the European Union's Schengen accords.
Posted by: lotp || 11/19/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [6 views] Top|| File under:

#1  .....there was no evidence there would be an invasion of criminals and terrorists when border checks cease on December 21, and when the after-the-fact evidence does arrive, we plan to ingnore it, just as they do in United States.
Posted by: Besoeker || 11/19/2007 1:00 Comments || Top||

#2  In other words, "we know there will be a ton of gangsters operating freely, and we don't care."
Posted by: gromky || 11/19/2007 4:33 Comments || Top||

#3  Why do the Krauts have border police? I thought all the EU was an open zone;)
Posted by: Spot || 11/19/2007 8:22 Comments || Top||

#4  Not the whole EU, just the member parties of Schengen. Poland and the Czech Republic have not been members of Schengen up to now.

And the fact that a border is open doesn't mean that you don't patrol it.
Posted by: Mad Eye Shereger9705 || 11/19/2007 10:02 Comments || Top||

#5  Secret demonstration recording
Posted by: ed || 11/19/2007 18:22 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Pelosi tries to force Salvation Army to hire people who can't speak English
It's been less than a week since New York's Sen. Hillary Clinton and Gov. Eliot Spitzer had to climb down from their support of driver's licenses for illegal aliens. Now House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has moved to kill an amendment that would protect employers from federal lawsuits for requiring their workers to speak English. Among the employers targeted by such lawsuits: the Salvation Army.
Oh yeah. Representing the average US citizen from SF for sure.
Sen. Lamar Alexander, a moderate Republican from Tennessee, is dumbstruck that legislation he views as simple common sense would be blocked. He noted that the full Senate passed his amendment to shield the Salvation Army by 75-19 last month, and the House followed suit with a 218-186 vote just this month. "I cannot imagine that the framers of the 1964 Civil Rights Act intended to say that it's discrimination for a shoe shop owner to say to his or her employee, 'I want you to be able to speak America's common language on the job,' " he told the Senate last Thursday.
Hey, remember who you're dealing with here.
But that's exactly what the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is trying to do. In March the EEOC sued the Salvation Army because its thrift store in Framingham, Mass., required its employees to speak English on the job. The requirement was clearly posted and employees were given a year to learn the language. The EEOC claimed the store had fired two Hispanic employees for continuing to speak Spanish on the job. It said that the firings violated the law because the English-only policy was not "relevant" to job performance or safety.
Wearing clothes to work isn't either . . . .
"If it is not relevant, it is discriminatory, it is gratuitous, it is a subterfuge to discriminate against people based on national origin," says Rep. Charles Gonzalez of Texas, one of several Hispanic Democrats in the House who threatened to block Ms. Pelosi's attempts to curtail the Alternative Minimum Tax unless she killed the Alexander amendment.
Isn't blackmail illegal? Oh, I forgot, they're not little people.
The confrontation on the night of Nov. 8 was ugly. Members of the Hispanic Caucus initially voted against the rule allowing debate on a tax bill that included the AMT "patch," which for a year would protect some 23 million Americans from being kicked into a higher income tax bracket.
That seems like exposure they don't really need right now, neither for themselves nor their constituents.
Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, a moderate from Maryland, was beside himself. Congressional Quarterly reports that he jabbed his finger on the House floor at Joe Baca, the California Democrat who chairs the Hispanic Caucus, and yelled, "How dare you destroy this party? This will be the worst loss in 10 years."
I wonder how long before the MSM picks this up.
Mr. Baca was having none of it. "You see this on the [voting] board?," he yelled back. "This is against me. This is against me personally." Luckily for Democrats, C-Span's microphones did not pick up the exchange. But it was audible to reporters in the press gallery. They also heard Rep. Luis Gutierrez of Illinois say that English-only efforts were symbolic of "bigotry and prejudice" against those who speak other languages.
Actually I find being able to speak English opens opportunities for me that I wouldn't have otherwise, bonehead.
After testy negotiations, the Hispanic Caucus finally agreed to let the tax bill proceed after extracting a promise from Ms. Pelosi that the House will not vote on the bill funding the Justice and Commerce Departments unless the English-only protection language is dropped. "There ain't going to be a bill" with the Alexander language, Mr. Baca has told reporters.

Sen. Alexander says that if that's the case, "thousands of small businesses across America will have to show there is some special reason to justify requiring their employees to speak our country's common language on the job." He notes that the number of EEOC actions against English-only policies grew to some 200 last year from 32 a decade ago. In an attempt at compromise, he has offered watered-down language that would still allow the EEOC to file many actions, but he says House Democrats rejected it.

Mr. Alexander says his battle is about far more than what language is spoken on a shop floor. "The EEOC actions turn diversity, our greatest strength, against the interests of our common future as Americans," he told me.

The late Albert Shanker, head of the American Federation of Teachers, once pointed out that public schools were established in this country largely "to help mostly immigrant children learn the three R's and what it means to be an American, with the hope that they would go home and teach their parents the principles in the Constitution and the Declaration that unite us."

Mr. Alexander says that noble effort is in danger of being undermined: "We have spent the last 40 years in our country celebrating diversity at the expense of unity. One way to create that unity is to value, not devalue, our common language, English."

The battle over Mr. Alexander's amendment is about whether a consensus that used to unite liberals and conservatives in this country can continue to hold. If it can't, expect the issue to become a flashpoint in the 2008 elections. Republicans have their political problems with Hispanics over some of their approaches to illegal immigration, but they may be nothing compared to the problems Democrats have if they continue to cave in to their anti-assimilation extremists.
No entiendo y no importame.
Posted by: gorb || 11/19/2007 15:21 || Comments || Link || [6 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "Republicans have their political problems with Hispanics over some of their approaches to illegal immigration,..."
Its not just Republicans who have a problem, I have a problem with anyone who purposely breaks a known law...oh, the writer means 'their' as in the Republicans?..well, this writer's grasp of English is not so great itself then.

"...but they may be nothing compared to the problems Democrats have if they continue to cave in to their anti-assimilation extremists."
Come on, you can do better than that. How about 'dirty naughty anti-assimilation extremist doo-doo head kitten stompers'?
Posted by: swksvolFF || 11/19/2007 16:29 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
Border cam: Texas to stream live video over the Net
Gov. Rick Perry's proposal to broadcast live video footage from the border over the Internet should be up and running again by January now that new funding has been secured, a spokesman said. Perry spokeswoman Allison Castle said the governor has found $3 million in federal grants to install about 200 mobile cameras along the Texas-Mexico border.

The cameras were pitched during Perry's 2006 re-election campaign as a way for anyone via the Internet to become a border patroller and help root out border crime and illegal crossings.

A $200,000 test run that lasted about a month last year led authorities to 10 undocumented immigrants, one drug deal and one human smuggling route.

But earlier this year, lawmakers rejected Perry's request for $5 million to restart the program and add more cameras. "Lawmakers felt unanimous that immigration is a federal issue," said state Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso. "Why burden local and state taxpayers with a federal obligation?"

Castle said the new cameras will be installed in "strategic high-traffic areas along the border." The system should be running by January, although it may be longer before the footage is available online, she added.
Posted by: lotp || 11/19/2007 00:00 || Comments || Link || [5 views] Top|| File under:

#1  As long as they don't display border patrol positions and patterns, it could be a useful tool for both voter education/persuasion and law enforcement.
Posted by: gorb || 11/19/2007 2:33 Comments || Top||

#2  When are they adding Huntsville gurney cam?
Posted by: M. Murcek || 11/19/2007 19:07 Comments || Top||

#3  Oh, great! Now we can watch illegals cross into our country in real time.

And I thought they were running out of ideas for new reality TV shows.
Posted by: Grumenk Philalzabod0723 || 11/19/2007 22:28 Comments || Top||


International-UN-NGOs
New Report to Show U.N. Overestimated AIDS Epidemic
By Craig Timberg

JOHANNESBURG, Nov. 19 -- The United Nations' top AIDS scientists this week plan to acknowledge that they long have overestimated both the size and course of the epidemic, which they now believe has been ebbing for nearly a decade, according to U.N. documents prepared for the announcement.

AIDS remains a devastating public health crisis in the most heavily impacted areas of sub-Saharan Africa. But the sweeping revisions amount to at least a partial acknowledgment of criticisms long leveled by outside researchers who disputed the U.N.'s portrayal of an ever-rising epidemic on the march across the globe.

The latest estimates, due to be released publicly Wednesday, put the number of annual new HIV infections at 2.5 million, a cut of more than 40 percent from last year's estimate, documents show. The worldwide total of people infected with HIV -- estimated a year ago at nearly 40 million and rising -- now will be reported as 33 million, with the numbers of new infections falling.

Having millions of fewer people with a lethal, contagious disease is good news. However, some researchers have contended that persistent overestimates in the U.N.'s widely quoted reports have skewed funding decisions while also obscuring potential lessons about how to slow the spread of HIV. Critics also have said that U.N. officials overstated the epidemic to help gather political and financial support for combating AIDS.

"There was a tendency toward alarmism, and that fit perhaps a certain fundraising agenda," said Helen Epstein, author of the book "The Invisible Cure: Africa, the West and the Fight Against AIDS." "I hope these new numbers will help refocus the response in a more pragmatic way."

Annemarie Hou, spokeswoman for the U.N. AIDS agency, speaking from Geneva, declined to comment on the grounds that the report is not yet public. In documents obtained by The Washington Post, U.N. officials say the revisions came mainly from better measurements rather than from fundamental shifts in the epidemic. They also say that they are continually seeking to improve their tracking of AIDS with the latest available tools.

Among the reasons for the overestimate is methodology; U.N. officials traditionally based their HIV estimates for nations on the infection rates among pregnant women receiving prenatal care. As a group, they were more urban, wealthier and likely to be more sexually active than populations as a whole.

The U.N.'s AIDS agency, known as UNAIDS and led by Belgian scientist Peter Piot since its founding in 1995, has been a major advocate for increasing spending to combat the epidemic. Over the past decade, global spending on AIDS has grown by a factor of 30, to $10 billion a year.

But in its role in tracking the spread of the epidemic and recommending strategies to combat it, UNAIDS has drawn criticism in recent years from Epstein and others who accused it of being politicized and not scientifically rigorous.

For years, UNAIDS reports have portrayed a sprawling, rising epidemic that threatened to burst beyond its epicenter in southern Africa to create widespread illness and death in other countries. In China alone, one report warned, there would be 10 million infections -- up from 1 million in 2002 -- by the end of the decade.

Piot often wrote personal prefaces to these reports warning of the dangers of inaction, saying in 2006 that "the pandemic and its toll are outstripping the worst predictions."

But by then several years' worth of newer, more accurate studies already offered substantial evidence that the U.N.'s tools for measuring and predicting the epidemic were flawed.

Newer studies commissioned by governments and relying on random, census-style sampling techniques found consistently lower infection rates in dozens of countries. In India, the U.N. cut its estimate of HIV cases by more than half because of one such study completed this year. The new report also has made major cuts to U.N. estimates in Nigeria, Mozambique and Zimbabwe.

The revision affected not just the current number but past ones as well. A UNAIDS report from December 2002, for example, put the number of HIV cases at 42 million. The real number for that year, this week's report says, was 30 million.

The downward revisions also affect estimated numbers of orphans, AIDS deaths and patients in need of costly antiretroviral drugs -- all major factors in setting funding levels for the world's response to the epidemic.

James Chin, a former World Health Organization AIDS expert long critical of UNAIDS, said even these revisions might not go far enough. He estimated the number of cases worldwide at 25 million.

"If they're coming out with 33 million, they're getting closer. It's a little high, but it's not outrageous anymore," Chin, author of "The AIDS Pandemic: The Collision of Epidemiology With Political Correctness," said from Berkeley, Calif.

The picture of the AIDS epidemic offered by new studies, and set to be endorsed by U.N. scientists in this week's announcement, shows a massive concentration of infection in the southern third of Africa, with nations such as Swaziland and Botswana reporting that as many as one in four adults is infected with HIV.

Rates are lower in East Africa and much lower in West Africa. Researchers say that the prevalence of circumcision -- which slows the spread of HIV -- and regional variations in sexual behavior are the biggest factors in determining the severity of the epidemic in different countries and even within countries.

Beyond Africa, the AIDS epidemic is more likely to be concentrated among high-risk groups such as users of injectable drugs, sex workers and gay men. More precise measurements of infection rates should allow for better targeting of prevention measures, researchers say.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 11/19/2007 19:34 || Comments || Link || [4 views] Top|| File under:

#1  sex workers = sex industry professionals, in the case you are unfamliar with the first label. ;-)
Posted by: twobyfour || 11/19/2007 20:21 Comments || Top||

#2  Because we all know Global Warming is the new Chicken Little to scare the world with and wring out money and power from the gullible masses.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 11/19/2007 20:23 Comments || Top||

#3  There was a tendency toward alarmism, and that fit perhaps a certain fundraising agenda catering menu

All fixed.
Posted by: Zenster || 11/19/2007 22:00 Comments || Top||


Home Front Economy
CBS News writers to vote on strike
About 500 unionized news writers could soon join their creative colleagues on the picket line.
Oh please, oh please, oh please, oh please ...
The writers, employees of CBS News television and radio, are expected to overwhelmingly approve a strike authorization. Represented by Writers Guild of America East, the writers were scheduled to vote Thursday.

WGA drama and comedy writers are entering the second week of an entertainment industry strike that has shaken network and cable television, threatening popular shows such as Fox's 24 and sending late-night talk shows, such as Comedy Central's Daily Show with Jon Stewart, into unplanned reruns.

The CBS News television and radio writers have been working under an expired contract since April 2005, WGA East spokeswoman Sherry Goldman said. The strike authorization vote does not mean the writers — who work in New York, Los Angeles, Washington and Chicago — will necessarily stage a work stoppage, but neither side seemed optimistic.

"CBS News is prepared for the possibility of a writers strike. We will continue to make stuff up produce quality news programming for our viewers," CBS said in a statement. A spokeswoman said CBS News would not have any further comment.
But what will CBS News broadcast, if the "-tainment" is removed from their "info-tainment"?
Posted by: Anonymoose || 11/19/2007 16:16 || Comments || Link || [8 views] Top|| File under:

#1  So who's going to make up the news?
Posted by: M. Murcek || 11/19/2007 16:44 Comments || Top||

#2  But what will CBS News broadcast, if the "-tainment" is removed from their "info-tainment"?

Easy. Candlepin bowling...
Posted by: tu3031 || 11/19/2007 16:52 Comments || Top||

#3  You mean they might have to report actual news?!?! Oh the humanity!!!
Posted by: DarthVader || 11/19/2007 17:02 Comments || Top||

#4  They could bring back Honest Dan and Uncle Walter and just make up the news like they used to.
Posted by: ed || 11/19/2007 18:03 Comments || Top||

#5  Update:

CBS News writers authorize union to call a strike

See BS.
See BS writers walk out on strike.
See Katie cry.
See BS go titzup.
Ha, ha, ha.


Posted by: Dave D. || 11/19/2007 19:54 Comments || Top||

#6  So five hundred people are going to show they do nothing but rewrite the material already collected by AP and al Reuters. Maybe the execs at CBS can so some serious cost saving by outsourcing the entire division. Seriously, hire Univision with some bi-lingual anchor. Shift the focus off of Europe and back to our own hemisphere. Grab for the demographic of mixed generation households.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 11/19/2007 20:27 Comments || Top||

#7  About 500 unionized news writers could soon join their creative colleagues on the picket line.

I would say that the news writers should be considered creative writers, based on MSM content. Since the creative writers are already on strike, logic sez the newzies, as creative writers themselves, should be pounding the pavement, too.

This is another golden moment to have the MSM self-destruct and maybe---just maybe---other sources can start informing the American public on the truth.

/big ole dream
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 11/19/2007 20:45 Comments || Top||

#8  Tough Shit CBS and Writers.
Posted by: 3dc || 11/19/2007 21:51 Comments || Top||

#9  You mean Perky Katie doesn't make up her own lies? She outsources them?

That's shocking.

Next you'll be telling me she's a bubble-headed MSM dipshit who couldn't find her ass with both hands and a flashlight.

Oh, wait....
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 11/19/2007 22:21 Comments || Top||

#10  Jayson Blair is still looking for work, right?

What a natural fit!
Posted by: Grumenk Philalzabod0723 || 11/19/2007 22:24 Comments || Top||

#11  So who's going to make up the news?


Manatees?
Posted by: DMFD || 11/19/2007 22:32 Comments || Top||



Who's in the News
59[untagged]
7Govt of Pakistan
4Islamic Courts
3Iraqi Insurgency
3Taliban
2TNSM
2Hamas
2Palestinian Authority
2PFLP
1Govt of Syria
1al-Qaeda in Iraq
1al-Qaeda
1HUJI
1Hezbollah

Bookmark
E-Mail Me

The Classics
The O Club
Rantburg Store
The Bloids
The Never-ending Story
Thugburg
Gulf War I
The Way We Were
Bio

Merry-Go-Blog











On Sale now!


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.
Click here for more information

Meet the Mods
In no particular order...
Steve White
Seafarious
tu3031
badanov
sherry
ryuge
GolfBravoUSMC
Bright Pebbles
trailing wife
Gloria
Fred
Besoeker
Glenmore
Frank G
3dc
Skidmark

Two weeks of WOT
Mon 2007-11-19
  Israel agrees to return 20,000 Palestinian refugees
Sun 2007-11-18
  Negroponte meets with Perv
Sat 2007-11-17
  40 militants killed as gunships pound Swat and Shangla
Fri 2007-11-16
  Philippines reaches deal with MILF
Thu 2007-11-15
  Morticia Hopes to Form Nat'l Unity Gov't
Wed 2007-11-14
  TNSM spreads outside Swat
Tue 2007-11-13
  Blasts rips through Philippines Congress building
Mon 2007-11-12
  Seven dead at festivities honoring Yasser
Sun 2007-11-11
  Thousands flee Mogadishu, over 80 killed
Sat 2007-11-10
  Sheikh al-Ubaidi, four others from Salvation Council in Diyala killed by suicide boomer
Fri 2007-11-09
  AQI Is Out of Baghdad, U.S. Says
Thu 2007-11-08
  Militants now in control of most of Swat
Wed 2007-11-07
  Swat's Buddha carving has been decapitated
Tue 2007-11-06
  Suicide bomber kills scores in northern Afghanistan
Mon 2007-11-05
  Around 60 Taliban, four police dead in Afghan attacks


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.
3.145.74.54
Help keep the Burg running! Paypal:
WoT Operations (22)    WoT Background (30)    Opinion (12)    Local News (10)    (0)