Olny srmat poelpe can raed this.
I cdnuolt blveiee that I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd what I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in what oredr the ltteers in a word are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is that the first and last ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can still raed it wouthit a porbelm. This is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the word as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? Yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! If you can raed this psas it on !!
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
02/02/2010 16:53 ||
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#1
I seem to do better when I relax and read it faster rather than trying to untangle each word. Cool!
The White House shifts from conciliatory diplomacy to get-tough actions, notably in arms sales to Taiwan and in stiffer sanctions on Iran for its nuclear deceit. Obama can no longer appear to be weak, but then again, there are risks to adopting a confrontational style.
Let's see: the Saudis mediated between Hamas and the PA, with the result of... absolutely no change. What other mediations have they attempted? Have they had any successes at all?
Afghan President Hamid Karzai's call for Saudi mediation between the Afghan government and the Taliban movement and tribal groups in order to achieve peace in the country is the right move but is long overdue. Saudi Arabia is the most capable country in the world of undertaking this role due to its position in the Islamic world and also because its mediation is internationally acceptable. The Taliban movement may have no way of breaking its international isolation other than by accepting Saudi mediation. This is the only opportunity open to the Taliban, and the Taliban must not throw this away, especially as Saudi Arabia was one of only three countries that recognized the Taliban regime. This was when the Taliban movement was working to protect the citizens of Afghanistan from the oppression of the Afghan warlords, resisting corruption and eradicating drug cultivation in the country. However when the Taliban took control of the majority of the country the movement became more extremist, restricting representations of modern life, and restricting women's rights, and even Afghan antiquities were not safe from this extremism and narrow-mindedness. However the most important and dangerous mistake made by the Taliban was to turn Afghanistan into a safe haven for terrorism and terrorists, this was a transformation that precipitated their clash with the international community, and resulted in their defeat following the September 11 attacks.
The statements made by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal on President Karzai's request for Saudi mediation are logical, for he did not close the door on this, but stated that this request should be made by Afghanistan officially, and that the Taliban should confirm its intention to attend negotiations by cutting ties with terrorists. Prince Saud al-Faisal said the Taliban's sincere intentions to establish peace must begin with cutting its ties with militants, and ceasing to provide sanctuary to Osama Bin Laden. He said that it is not logical for Saudi Arabia to mediate a crisis between two parties, one of whom is providing a safe haven to terrorist groups that are hostile to Saudi Arabia and the world at large.
Karzai's call for Saudi mediation may hold the only hope for the Taliban to put an end to its [international] isolation, displacement, and pursuit. This is a good opportunity for the Taliban to improve its image, and rectify its mistakes and its relations with the international community, thereby becoming an acceptable component of Afghan society.
Will the Taliban survive, ending its alliance with the militants? Or will it continue in its obstinacy, clinging to the mistakes that it made in the past, collapsing -- along with its allies -- in a spiral of violence, the result of which is already a foregone conclusion?
If the Afghan government is asking for mediation with the Taliban today, then a Taliban rejection of this would limit the choices of the Afghan government and the world, and therefore the war against the Taliban movement and its allies would become inevitable, if this happens then the Taliban would have committed a fatal mistake.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/02/2010 00:00 ||
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#1
No mediation, no surrender , annihilation please.. Bye bye vermin.
Negotiations complete
Posted by: Sonny Uno ||
02/02/2010 2:21 Comments ||
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It ain't easy being a laid-off hack leftist cartoonist with a penchant for slandering 9/11 widows and equating U.S. soldiers with suicide bombers. But Ted Rall got a big break on Friday when he got a chance to do a fundraising pitch for his planned trip to Afghanistan as an "unembedded" journalist.
On his January 29 program, MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan introduced Rall as "an award-winning cartoonist who caught our eye with cartoons like this one showing some Wall Street types chatting about President Obama's bank tax."
But Ratigan must be ignorant of or apathetic regarding Rall's penchant for soldier-smearing left-wing screeds. After all, he all but personally endorsed Rall's fundraising pitch (audio available here):
RATIGAN: You're also a writer and a journalist who's reported from places like Afghanistan. Newspapers and magazines no longer put much money up for this type of work, so you're now using public donations to finance your journalism? How does that work?
RALL: Well, there's a Web site called kickstarter.com that I've been using to ask for donations, pledges, to help send me back to Afghanistan this summer, to do some independent, unembedded journalism of the kind that I think is sorely missing, especially since so many magazines, as you said, just don't have the money anymore.
RATIGAN: Alright, kickstarter.com. Ted, a pleasure, thank you so much.
#1
That's really gonna suck being the soldiers that have to provide security for this a**hole. Almost too bad they are too professional to just step back and let him 'discover' an IED.
Posted by: Mike ||
02/02/2010 13:01 Comments ||
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#3
Oooh. "Unembedded". Think of the possibilities.
Maybe the Taliban can hook him up with that crazy Canadian chick that used to run Jihad Unspun. They'll have a lot in common. For one thing, nobody cares what happens to her either...
My bet? He pussys out and uses the "not enough money" excuse.
#1
The international community lies at the center of the Obama foreign policy. Unfortunately, it is a fiction. There is no such thing. Different countries have different histories, geographies, necessities, and interests. There's no natural, inherent, or enduring international community. What community of interest is there between, say, the United States, Iran, Zimbabwe, and Burma?
Man...Krauthammer must be a member of the Slapahoe tribe!
#3
led to some enthusiastic talk about a new Obama Doctrine variously described as a kind of Christian realism, Niebuhrian tragic-mindedness, or a fusion of realism and idealism.
...or simply acute sociopathic dysfunction. (manipulative, behaving irregularly [saying one thing - doing another], lack of empathy or trust, difficulty with relationships, etc.)
(via Debka) US intelligence finds 5,000 Hizballah training to seize Galilee towns.
When US NSA James Jones warned Iran may lash out at Israel via its surrogates Hizballah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza in response to increasing international pressure over its nuclear program, he spoke on the strength of a detailed war plan, summarized here with attached map.
Hizballah would sweep across the border to capture Galilee towns backed by missile barrages and likely Syrian support.
Arm the populace and emplace anti-missile thingies in the town centers. Conquering Israeli communities is s'posed to be hard.
They could try, then they would die.
The Hezbies might want to consult with the Syrians on the last time the Syrians tried to invade Israel.
Jones was not talking out of the top of his head, but on the strength of solid US intelligence gathered over months on detailed war plans Iran, Syria, Hizballah and Hamas have drawn up to send five Hizballah brigades sweeping across the border to seize five sectors of Galilee, while also organizing a massive Israeli-Arab uprising against the Jewish state.
Hamas would open a second front in the south and in the east. Syria is expected to step in at some stage.
Iran's Revolutionary Guards instructors at especially established training facilities near Tehran are already well advanced in training a cadre of 5,000 Hizballah fighters in special operations and urban combat tactics to standards equivalent to those current in similar US and Israeli military forces.
At the outset of the course, the group was split up into five battalions, each given a specific northern Israeli sector for capture with details of its topography and population for close study.
If anything remotely resemblng this gets underway it might also spell the end for Syria as presently constituted, as well as some interesting changes in Lebanon and Turkey, to just pick the near neighborhood.
Following the assassination of Qassam Brigades leading figure Mahmoud al Mabhouh in his [hotel] room in Dubai, the leaders of Hamas came out threatening and promising to avenge his death. This is understandable and only expected due to the nature of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict; however what was not clear was whether Hamas was threatening revenge on Israel or was threatening to violate the land of Arab countries.
Some Hamas leaders began to remind us of the history of the intelligence war between the Palestinian Liberation Organization [PLO] and Israel in the past and it seems that for the first time Hamas is acknowledging the PLO's struggle and what it did for the Palestinian cause, as Hamas mentioned conflicts that took place in Cyprus for example. Mahmoud Zahar, a leading Hamas figure, went further than that when he openly threatened that "we send a clear message to the Arab countries with ties to the Zionist side to learn from the lesson of this crime that was committed."
He added, (and this is the crux of the matter), "Today, the incident has been repeated in the UAE, and I believe that the UAE and other [states] must realize that the Zionist side does not respect the sovereignty of any Arab country nor of any state in the world, and that its own interest takes precedence over all interests of nations. [In this regard] there must be reconsideration of ties between the Zionist enemy and the states and [there must be] evaluation [of ties] in light of the crimes committed by the occupying state against the Palestinian people."
The first mistake is that the UAE does not have ties with the "Zionist side" to use Zahar's terms. Is Hamas trying to say that Mossad agents are moving around freely in UAE territory for example and that this is known to the authorities there? If Mahmoud al Mabhouh himself -- the Hamas commander who was assassinated in Dubai and who was assigned the task of liaising between Hamas and Iran -- entered the UAE from Damascus on what was said to be an Iraqi passport (but that is another story altogether) and using a different name, and the UAE authorities did not know at the time that he was a leading figure of the Qassam Brigades or that he was wanted by Mossad for 20 years, then how would the UAE security authorities or others know whether or not those coming to the UAE are agents of Mossad or other apparatus?
If Mahmoud al Mabhouh did not carry a real passport and did not have his real name on it then should we expect that Mossad agents would have their real names and the nature of their work contained in their passports? With al Mabhouh's presence in Dubai, and after it became known that he was the liaison with Iran, it became clear that it was Hamas that initiated exploiting Arab states including the UAE to carry out its activities that expose those Arab countries to danger. Therefore, what Hamas is trying to say today following the assassination of al Mabhouh is nothing but controversy that can only be described as absurd and as an attempt to cover up previous violations carried out by Hamas against Arab states.
Therefore, the condemnation of al Mabhouh's assassination does not give Hamas a right to threaten Arab states or to violate Arab territories. Rather, the question here is why al Mabhouh didn't -- and others for that matter -- carry out his work in Syria for example? We must remind Hamas here that Imad Mughniyeh and others were assassinated in Syria without there being any ties between Damascus and the "Zionist side" in Zahar's words!
Posted by: Fred ||
02/02/2010 00:00 ||
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It is no secret that Mackinac Center scholars have been fierce critics of the Michigan Film Incentive. We are not the only ones. Several Michigan legislators, Lansing budget analysts and scholars have also spoken out against the program as being ineffective and too expensive.
The Michigan Film Incentive is a state economic development program whereby state government offers large tax credits and outright cash subsidies to filmmakers who make some portion of their films here. The program rebates up to 42 percent of a filmmaker's Michigan expenses. The amount that exceeds the filmmaker's state business tax liability is reimbursed by a check from the Treasury and signed by John Q. Taxpayer.
Because the state faces another large budget deficit, there is serious talk about reducing or eliminating the $100 million-plus boondoggle. Knowing from the start that their program is vulnerable to economic realities (not to mention political ones and common sense), film incentive officials should have been relatively sensitive about avoiding whiffs of impropriety.
So it is baffling to see the state offer Michigan filmmaker Michael Moore a refundable tax credit for his documentary "Capitalism: A Love Story." This subsidy should be rejected by Moore on principle alone.
Moore isn't just any filmmaker. He is a current member of the Michigan Film Office Advisory Council, a state organ created to advise the Michigan Film Office, which is responsible for approving applications for Michigan's film incentive program. I do not believe it strains credulity to suggest that Moore's very presence on the council may have led to the film office approving special tax treatment for his work.
Giving an advisory council member's project tax credits makes this government "jobs" program look like a good ole' boys network where "la familia" takes care of its own - and with taxpayer dollars. This is not the only instance of high-ranking state officials appearing to benefit directly from the state program in which they play (or played) a role.
Recently, Michigan Film Office Director Janet Lockwood was given a role in a movie -- "Wild Michigan" -- that had been approved by her office for subsidies. Lockwood blithely dismissed conflict of interest questions from my colleague, Kathy Hoekstra, by arguing that the she had not been paid. But as an actress she was in fact paid; paid with the opportunity to appear on the Silver Screen - an honor for which many actors would themselves pay.
Former state Rep. Bill Huizenga (now a congressional candidate) helped shepherd the Michigan film incentive program to passage in the Legislature. He did so while sitting on the Board of Compass Film Academy, a Grand Rapids-based film school. Lockwood called Huizenga -- who was apparently given the moniker "Hollywood Huizenga" for helping muscle the film incentive through the Legislature -- "our hero."
But there is nothing heroic about public "servants" appearing to embrace government programs for the public good, only to discover what appear to be private conflicts of interest. This could be called crony capitalism or corporatism -- both pejoratives -- that describe commercial successes that are dependent on close interpersonal relationships between government officials and the private sector.
Moore's acceptance of the Michigan film incentive subsidy is troubling because he has grown wealthy railing against corporations and capitalist institutions -- such as Wall Street -- for enriching themselves at the expense of the little guy and taxpayers.
In the trailer for "Capitalism: A Love Story," Moore shows up on Wall Street and says, "...we're here to get the money back for the American people..." This is in reference to the high-profile bailout of big banks (and other institutions) by the federal government. By accepting a state subsidy, Moore, who shows disdain for private, for-profit businesses raiding the pocketbooks of Americans, engages in this very practice himself.
Even more galling is that Moore is set to feed on Michigan's beleaguered taxpayers. The Great Lake State has had the highest unemployment rate in the nation for 46 months and currently stands at 14.6 percent. As measured by state Gross Domestic Product Michigan has experienced a lost decade of economic growth. Worse, our per-capita personal income rank among the states has plummeted from 23rd to 37th since 2003. Not since the Great Depression years have the incomes of Michigan residents been so comparatively low. We are becoming a poorer state with each passing year.
Lastly, it is very unlikely that this program is actually effective in creating jobs anyway -- which is its purported purpose. As I detailed in a previous Policy Brief titled "Special Effects: Flawed Report on Film Incentives Provides Distorted Lens," such government jobs programs frequently fail to create jobs. One reason is because robbing Peter to pay Paul does not enrich both Peter and Paul. Michigan hiked taxes $1.4 billion just months before creating the film program to redistribute a portion of it to lucky filmmakers. At best, this creates a jobs wash, not new economic growth.
It is against this backdrop that Moore -- with his every-man theatrics -- asks the taxpayers of Michigan to subsidize his work and by extension his life. He should not. Doing so just smells like a conflict of interest and it makes this award-winning filmmaker appear hypocritical and insensitive to the plight of Michigan's taxpayers.
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.
