Gary Sinise, best known for playing Lt. Dan, who lost his legs fighting in Vietnam in Forrest Gump, this week returned to South Carolinas Lowcountry, where much of the 1994 film was shot.
The patriotic actor was there for the second annual Lt. Dan Weekend, a gathering of military personnel and veterans who were severely wounded in Afghanistan and Iraq.
We have a lot of folks who are banged up out there and need our help, said Sinise, the star of CSI-New York, during a Thursday reception for the 65 wounded personnel. I always remember this . . . Calvin Coolidge quote that the nation that forgets its heroes will itself be forgotten.
There is no bill, it wont create any jobs, and it will be paid for with money we dont have.
The president has taken to the campaign trail to promote his American Jobs Act. Thats a good name for it: an act. Pass this bill now! he declared 24 times at a stop in Raleigh, N.C., and another 18 in Columbus, Ohio, and the act is sufficiently effective that, three years into the Vapidity of Hope, the president can still find crowds of true believers willing to chant along with him: Pass this bill now!
Not all supporters are content merely to singalong with the prompter-in-chief. In North Carolina, a still-devoted hopeychanger cried out, I love you!
I love you, too, said the president. But . . .
Oh, no, here it comes: conditional love. But, if you love me, youve got to help me pass this bill! Youd be surprised how effective this line is: I tried it on Darlene in the back of my Ford Edsel when I was 17 and we didnt get home till two in the morning.
Pass this bill now, or Ill say Pass this bill now! another two dozen times! With this latest inspiration, Obama has taken the post-modern phase of democratic politics to a whole new level. Pass this jobs bill? Simply as a matter of humdrum reality, there is no bill, it wont create any jobs, and it will be paid for with money we dont have. But the smartest president in history has calculated that, if he says the same four monosyllables over and over, a nonexistent bill to create nonexistent jobs with nonexistent money will be yet another legislative triumph in the grand tradition of his first stimulus (the original Dumb and Dumber to the sequels Stimulus and Stimulusser).
The estimated cost of the non-bill is just shy of half a trillion dollars. Gosh, it seems like only yesterday that Washington was in the grip of a white-knuckle, clenched-teeth showdown over whether a debt-ceiling deal could be reached before the allegedly looming deadline. When the deal was triumphantly unveiled at the eleventh hour, it was revealed that our sober, prudent, fiscally responsible masters had gotten control of the runaway spending and had carved (according to the most optimistic analysis) a whole $7 billion dollars of savings out of the 2012 budget. The president then airily breezes into Congress and in 20 minutes adds another $447 billion to the tab. Thats what meaningful course-correction in Washington boils down to: Seven billion steps forward, 447 billion steps back.
This $447 billion does not exist, and even foreigners dont want to lend it to us. A majority of it will be electronically created by the Federal Reserve buying U.S. Treasury debt. Dont worry, its not like printing money: We leave that to primitive basket cases like Zimbabwe. This is more like one of those Nigerian e-mail schemes, in which a prominent public official promises you a large sum of money in return for your bank-account details. In the case of Ben Bernanke and Timothy Geithner, one prominent public official is promising to wire a large sum of money into the account of another prominent public official, which is a wrinkle even the Nigerians might have difficulty selling.
But not to worry. On Thursday night, the president told a Democratic fundraiser in Washington that the Pass My Jobs Bill bill would create 1.9 million new jobs. What kind of jobs are created by this kind of magical thinking? Well, theyre green jobs and, if we know anything about green jobs, its that they take a lot of green. German taxpayers subsidize green jobs in their wind-power industry to the tune of a quarter of a million dollars per worker per year: $250,000 per green job would pay for a lot of real jobs, even in the European Union. Last year, it was revealed that the Spanish government paid $800,000 for every green job on a solar-panel assembly line. I had assumed carelessly that this must be a world record in terms of taxpayer subsidy per fraudulent green job. But it turns out those cheapskate Spaniards with their lousy nickel-and-dime green jobs subsidy just werent thinking big. The Obama administrations $38.6 billion clean technology program was supposed to create or save 65,000 jobs. Half the money has been spent $17.2 billion and we have 3,545 jobs to show for it. That works out to an impressive $4,851,904.09 per green job. A world record! Take that, you loser Spaniards! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!
So, based on previous form, Obamas prediction of 1.9 million new jobs will result in the creation of 92,000 new jobs, mostly in the Federal Department of Green Jobs Grant Applications.
Just to put it in perspective, the breezy $447 billion price tag for the Pass My Jobs Bill jobs bill is about 20 times higher than the most recent Greek government deficit currently threatening the stability of the entire eurozone. Indeed Greeces projected 2011 deficit $24 billion at last count is little more than half of just one of Obamas boutique, niche green jobs programs. As Churchill almost said, never in the field of human con tricks has so much been owed by so many to so little effect.
Fortunately, there is no American Jobs Act. Indeed, the other day, tired of waiting for Obama to turn his telepromptered pseudo-bill into a typewritten actual bill, the Texas congressman Louie Gohmert waggishly introduced an American Jobs Act all of his own. But back on the campaign trail the chanting goes on, last weeks election results in Nevada and New York notwithstanding. America has the lowest employment since the early Eighties, the lowest property ownership since the mid-Sixties, the highest deficit-to-GDP ratio since the Second World War, the worst long-term unemployment since the Great Depression, the highest government-dependency rate of all time, and the biggest debt mountain in the history of the planet. And the president has just announced to the world that hes checked the more-of-the-above box. The Pass My Jobs Bill jobs bill proclaims that this is all he knows and all he wants to know.
In my new book, I point out that Big Government leaves everything else smaller and, when its bigger than anything ever attempted, the everything else is going to be way smaller. Maybe if youre a public service worker or a tenured professor at Berkeley or a green-jobs racketeer or a New York Times columnist married to an heiress, you can afford Obama. But, if youre not, look at your home, look at your savings, and figure out whatll be left after another four years of stimulus.
I love you! squeals the Obammybopper in North Carolina. I love you, too, says Obama. But . . .
But: You gotta take this half-trillion-dollar bill, and the next one, and the one after that. Like Al Gore says in Love Story, love means never having to say youre sorry.
Ibrahim Abou-Nagie, a salafi/jihadi preacher very active online, has been indicted in Cologne, Germany. Abou-Nagie, together with Abu Dujana of Bonn, operate as Die Wahre Religion (The True Religion).
They are cited in multiple cases including those of the now-deceased Bekkay Harrach, and more recently Robert M. (arrested with an associate attempting to enter Britain whilst in possession of jihadist materials including Inspire magazine), not to mention Arid Uka, the Frankfurt shooter.
Abou-Nagie is charged with legitimization of violence and calling for the destruction of other religions (""Empfehlungen", die Gewalt legitimierten - bis zur Vernichtung Andersgläubiger" in German).
Not surprisingly, the 423 Youtube friends of Die Wahre Religion are in turn linked in some way to, or have otherwise turned up in the course of investigations into, the following (not an all-inclusive list):
Islamic Thinkers Society
Revolution Muslim
Shariah4
Taimour al-Abdaly
Arid Uka
Jubair Ahmad
Alemarah Media
Salahudin Ibn Jafar
Islambruederschaft
Binyamine
Abu Khalid Abdul-Latif
Emerson Begolly
Saurlandgruppe
Samir Khan
#1
Fight a war with what, exactly? Europe ran out of bombs supporting rebels in Libya.
Posted by: Mike Ramsey ||
09/17/2011 7:16 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Finally someone is looking at history to understand a possible future. He chose his words carefully "All these states [making economic reforms] must now demonstrate in a convincing way that they are serious. It is not enough to make plans. It is action that counts". I am impressed. Rostowski should be listened to. Governments and politics are prolonging the mess. Iceland has turned things around and Ireland is exporting more and importing less from China for example. It can be done. It must be done. We are tied to this mess and the world.
#3
Europe ran out of bombs supporting rebels in Libya.
And being the good idiots we are, we'll replace the damned things just in time to have them used against us.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
09/17/2011 8:04 Comments ||
Top||
#4
Well said Dale. As far as a war in Europe, perhaps what we might see are smaller scale uprisings or general anarchy. Peasant revolts and the like. Historical redux.
#7
Ok great. Let's invade Liechtenstein and plunder the bank vaults!
Posted by: European Conservative ||
09/17/2011 13:27 Comments ||
Top||
#8
I just wonder which of the EU will have the great idea to invade Switzerland and loot its banks, since the Swiss are insisting on their national sovereignty in the face of the EU's 'universal dominion' in Europe. If the Swiss and a couple of the Eastern European states like Poland and Hungary go together, you could see a new Hapsburg situation arise.
Posted by: Ricky bin Ricardo (Abu Babaloo) ||
09/17/2011 12:27 Comments ||
Top||
#8
An important note is that the ethnic Turkish birthrate has dropped "below replacement", European style, but the Kurdish birthrate is still high, at 3-6 children per family.
This means that while right now, about 70-75% of the population are Turkish, and only 18% are Kurds, in a few generations they will be much closer to parity.
The charming princeling who bailed out Citibank in the '90s and whose $10 million dollar check to New York City following 9/11 was torn up by dear, dear Mayor Guiliani, he is said to be the richest Saudi in the world...
announced this week he will launch a pro-Islamist 24-hour news network with New York Mayor Michael Nanny Bloomberg's privately held news service.
The deal has Bloomberg News providing five hours of financial and economic news programming throughout the day on the new "Alarab" channel, which the prince says will be "right of Al-Jazeera" -- that is, even more radical. It will no doubt promote Alwaleed's notoriously anti-Israel agenda.
Take the Ground Zero mosque. Bloomberg gave his blessing to the outrage. In fact, to the shock of many, the mayor actually promoted its construction. His support is said to have been colored by Alwaleed, who happens to be one of the project's biggest foreign boosters.
More troubling is Alwaleed's obsession with institutionalizing Shariah finance in the West -- and Bloomberg's receptiveness to the idea. Islamic banking rejects the cornerstone of Western finance: credit and interest rates. It also requires a share of profits go to Islamic charities, which often funnel money to terrorism.
With a $20 million endowment, Alwaleed has set up a Shariah law and finance section at Harvard University. Will Bloomberg help promote Shariah finance? He already is. Bloomberg LP has opened a regional hub in Dubai with an "Islamic finance portal."
"Since the meltdown of the Western capitalist system, there has been an increasingly large focus on the virtues of Islamic finance," Bloomberg's Mideast chief Max Linnington told "The National" newspaper of Dubai. "So by Bloomberg being here, we are in the process of building out an Islamic finance product."
Heading Alwaleed's TV network is a Saudi flack named Jamal Khashoggi, cousin of the Saudi arms dealer of Iran-Contra fame. In an Arab interview, Khashoggi revealed he grew up with the late Osama bin Laden ... he's rotten though not quite forgotten... in the radical Moslem Brüderbund, whose credo is "Jihad is our way; death in the cause of Allah our highest ambition."
He says he spent time with bin Laden in Afghanistan, Soddy Arabia and later in Sudan. "I met Osama in Jeddah" in 1987, Khashoggi said. "And ever since, I developed a close relationship with him." Don't worry, he says he no longer believes in forcing a caliphate like bin Laden. "Now, I believe this is the work of God."
[Dawn] HOLDING the heavily guarded centre of Kabul under siege for 20 hours, Tuesday`s terrorist attack was the capital`s longest sustained incident since the start of the war in 2001 and the third there in less than three months. With heavily gunnies able to get close to such fortified buildings as the US embassy and NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. It's headquartered in Belgium. That sez it all.... headquarters and launch gunfire and grenades at them, the immediate question the attack raises is that of the ability of Afghan cops to take over as Isaf troops withdraw. Kabul was handed over to domestic forces this summer, and if an area ensconced in multiple rings of security and checkpoints is still vulnerable to attack, what hope is there for the vast swaths of the country outside Kabul once foreign troops have gone home? And while the nature of this particular attack might have been unusual, figures from around the country indicate that violence is currently at its highest levels since the war began.
The attack also raises serious questions about the behind-the-scenes reconciliation effort that is apparently being conducted with the Taliban, which grabbed credit. Details of the nature, participants and progress of these talks has always been hazy, but the recent attacks indicate that they are either floundering or that the Taliban -- or certain Taliban factions or leaders not involved in them -- are continuing to carry out attacks despite the discussions. Recent reports that members of the Afghan government may have leaked the identities of some Taliban interlocutors demonstrated that all stakeholders might not be on board with the way the talks are being conducted. The overall picture, then, is of a reconciliation process that is proceeding very slowly, if not failing altogether.
American officials are blaming the attack on the Haqqani network, the faction of the Afghan Taliban said to be based in North Wazoo that Pakistain has long been asked to act against. So far the evidence seems to be circumstantial, with officials pointing to the method of the attack to support their claim, but pressure for an operation in North Waziristan will likely be applied again. In recent months Pakistain too has been asking for Afghan and Isaf action in north-eastern Afghanistan from where cut-throats who decampedSwat ...a valley and an administrative district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistain, located 99 mi from Islamabad. It is inhabited mostly by Pashto speakers. The place has gone steadily downhill since the days when Babe Ruth was the Sultan of Swat... and Bajaur have been launching attacks in Pak territory. Gen Kayani ... four star general, current Chief of Army Staff of the Mighty Pak Army. Kayani is the former Director General of ISI... and Adm Mullen are set to meet at a NATO conference in Spain later this week; now is the time for them to set aside blame games, admit to their respective security failures and chalk out a concrete plan for how both countries can play their part in improving the region`s security.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/17/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under: al-Qaeda in Pakistan
[Dawn] OUR society today exhibits all signs of decline. The institutional structures of a post-colonial administration have become redundant. They do not respond to the needs of a modern and free democratic polity of the information age.
The state which is a declared nuclear power is run like a mediaeval principality. We find ourselves in a state of social abandonment and political chaos. If you are not part of the patronage culture, you will be killed by the anonymous 'hit mans' and your body will litter the street.
Whenever an innocent person is killed, tortured or raped, a part of our Pak self is scared and mutilated. A shameful silence and withdrawal from the painful reality of social and political breakdown follows. We need to reverse the public discourse on this ever-increasing sense of despair, insanity and abandonment. We have got to work on public ethics in order to reverse the decline in governance.
Let us face the reality squarely. What is the most fundamental task of a government besides tax collection, appointments of diplomats and ministers? In my humble opinion, it's the maintenance of a just and peaceful social and political order. If a government cannot protect its harmless and armless citizens, then it must engage in deep soul-searching. It must reassess the ethical grounds of its being a government.
If government functionaries are not accountable to moral and legal imperatives, how then can we expect its just functioning?
What we find instead is a differential application of both law and ethics in society. If you are part of the culture of patronage then you have access to every resource. If you are not part of this fabulous system of reciprocal favouritism, you are simply doomed. You have no respect and self-esteem. You will always be at the lowest ebb of the food chain.
We inherited the mantle of an elitist-driven colonial administrative system from the British Raj. That system evolved from the ashes of a decadent Mughal, darbar-centered administration. The British-added civil service, military organization and legal institutions were designed to meet the needs of the foreign rulers. The police system which was put in place also perpetuated fear and domination of the same privileged classes in the post-colonial era. We have continued with that legacy of fear and domination.
The post-colonial Pak nawabs have continued that decadent Raj tradition of mass slavery and misuse of state resources.
The logic of this decadent governance system was simple: divide the people through fear of state power and rule as you wish.
This kind of governance style cannot continue anymore in the historical context of the information age.
The historical moment has arrived for us to decide whether we desire to live as free, just and morally aware people or we like to be remembered as a herd of sheep that lost their way in the battleground of history and civilisation. In order to exist as a morally aware people, we need to rebuild a new public morality which is driven by self-accountability and self-responsibility.
Each one of us in different social roles has to be self-conscious as a citizen of a democratic state, which is geared towards the creation of a cohesive and just society of self-conscious individuals. By protecting the autonomy and self-respect of each individual, our state shall be able to protect its autonomy and national respect. We need to shed the cloak of a Machiavellian rogue state and rebuild a republic of spiritual democracy of Iqbal based on the principles of freedom, autonomy and honour for all citizens.
We have to dismantle the present culture of patronage rooted in a decadent tradition of mass slavery inherited from the Raj.
This can be accomplished by changing our moral attitude to governance practices and state resources. There is no denying the fact that man is socially programmed from childhood to rely on and trust one's kith and kin, one's close friends and later on, one's peers. But when it comes to public responsibilities, we need to draw a boundary line between blood, friendship and the public good.
Why should I promote my incompetent nephew or niece over a competent Pak? Should I favour my inefficient uncle over an efficient citizen? Should I appoint my corrupt son-in-law as a public official when I have the choice of putting one honest man in his place? The public circle of incompetence, inefficiency and corruption is perpetuated by me and none else.
Thus, decline in personal ethics has a direct bearing on management of organizations, society and state institutions. We have to learn again to say 'no' at home so that we can save the state from further chaos.
There is also an external component which threatens our state, society and way of life. This is the result of our cumulative strategic misadventures in the region. The Afghan syndrome has left us divided as a society and state. Where to go from here?
Why should we sit quietly over our past mistakes? We should learn from them and redress the wrongs done, and heal the suffering of our people. The external threat can aggravate our social disorder if we do not respond to the internal lack of will to act, and live as a morally self-aware people. History will judge us by how we react now and not on the basis of what our ancestors did in their golden age.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/17/2011 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
#1
"when it comes to public responsibilities, we need to draw a boundary line between blood, friendship and the public good".
The decline is not the past but what he just stated above. This is the norm in most parts of the this world. We have it here. Democrat or Republican. Religion also at times. We want to be a part of a team but exclude others. Then many in leadership wish to harness and direct its people.
Like a Union(Hoffa Jr.). What's in my best interest. A "modern and free democratic polity of the information age" is an anathema unless the powers that be manage it.
PA President hasn't lost hope US, Europeans will be able to reach face-saving compromise to allow him to back out in a dignified manner.
Unfortunately for him, it is a false hope.
Paleostinian Authority President the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas ... a graduate of the prestigious unaccredited Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow with a doctorate in Holocaust Denial... is caught in a catch-22 situation.
If he succumbs to US, EU and Israeli calls to abandon his plan to seek full membership of a Paleostinian state in the UN next week, he will be condemned by many Paleostinians for capitulating to outside pressure.
There are several disillusioned PA and Fatah officials who are not happy with Abbas, especially because of the way he has been handling the grinding of the peace processor with Israel, and are waiting for the right moment and the first opportunity to pounce on him.
As one of his top aides put it on Thursday, "The president knows that if he jumps off the ship now, he will be devoured by the sharks."
Abbas needs a life jacket that will prevent him from drowning, and something that will protect him against the jaws of the sharks, the official explained.
Paleostinian officials say these are two things the Americans and Europeans have so far failed to provide.
The officials are particularly angry with US President Barack B.O. Obama for failing to provide Abbas with a ladder to climb down from the high tree.
Moreover, the PA officials accuse Obama of misleading them in the first place by giving them the impression that a Paleostinian state would be established by the time the UN General Assembly would meet this year.
They point to his speech at the UN last year, when the US president declared: "When we come back here next year, we can have an agreement that can lead to a new member of the United Nations ...a formerly good idea gone bad... , an independent, sovereign state of Paleostine."
In his recent meetings with US government officials, Abbas reminded them of Obama's "promise" and said the Paleostinians were acting in accordance with the US president's ostensible pledge.
Until this week, Paleostinian officials said Abbas was hoping Washington would accept his two conditions for returning to the negotiating table with Israel: a full cessation of settlement construction and Israeli recognition of the June 4, 1967, lines as the basis for peace talks aimed at achieving a two-state solution.
In the past few weeks, Abbas's message to Obama and other world leaders has been: Hold me back from going to the UN by making Israel accept the two conditions for resuming the peace talks.
Abbas still hasn't lost hope that the Americans and Europeans will be able to reach some kind of a face-saving compromise that will allow him to climb down from the high tree in a dignified manner. That's why he still hasn't submitted an official application for full membership in the UN.
The Paleostinian leader is hoping daily statements from PA officials about their determination to proceed with the statehood bid will increase pressure on the Americans and Europeans to come up with a formula that can be presented to the Paleostinian public as a victory. Abbas knows very well he would be doomed if he dropped the statehood plan without gaining something significant in return.
On the other hand, Abbas and many Paleostinians are well aware of the possibility that they would pay a heavy price if they insisted on going ahead with the statehood bid in defiance of the US and many EU countries.
Abbas is hoping the Arab and Islamic countries would compensate the Paleostinians for the loss of American and EU funds. In wake of the Arab Spring, he is betting on the Arab and Mohammedan masses, and not the governments, which have not been financially supportive of the Paleostinians over the past two decades.
This is why Abbas, during a visit to Cairo this week, appealed to all Arabs to take to the streets on September 23 to voice support for his statehood bid at the UN. The direct appeal to the Arab masses is an obvious sign that Abbas is not pinning high hopes on the governments and leaders.
But there are still many Paleostinians who are worried that Abbas is leading them toward the abyss with his statehood initiative.
The main concern is that the PA would go bankrupt without US and EU funding, leaving more than 150,000 civil servants without salaries. Other Paleostinians are also worried about the possibility of a third intifada erupting in the Paleostinian territories as tensions mount between Israel and the PA over the statehood bid.
#2
Abbas will be dead within the year, no matter what he does. He's toast. The only question is how much of the "Paleostain state" he'll take down with him.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
09/17/2011 18:08 Comments ||
Top||
#3
Hopefully all of it, OP.
Posted by: Barbara ||
09/17/2011 18:19 Comments ||
Top||
#4
Abbas? Didn't his term expire already?
Posted by: European Conservative ||
09/17/2011 18:58 Comments ||
Top||
PA President hasnt lost hope US, Europeans will be able to reach face-saving compromise to allow him to back out in a dignified manner.
Unfortunately for him, it is a false hope.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is caught in a catch-22 situation.
If he succumbs to US, EU and Israeli calls to abandon his plan to seek full membership of a Palestinian state in the UN next week, he will be condemned by many Palestinians for capitulating to outside pressure.
There are several disillusioned PA and Fatah officials who are not happy with Abbas, especially because of the way he has been handling the peace process with Israel, and are waiting for the right moment and the first opportunity to pounce on him.
As one of his top aides put it on Thursday, The president knows that if he jumps off the ship now, he will be devoured by the sharks.
Abbas needs a life jacket that will prevent him from drowning, and something that will protect him against the jaws of the sharks, the official explained.
Palestinian officials say these are two things the Americans and Europeans have so far failed to provide.
The officials are particularly angry with US President Barack Obama for failing to provide Abbas with a ladder to climb down from the high tree.
Moreover, the PA officials accuse Obama of misleading them in the first place by giving them the impression that a Palestinian state would be established by the time the UN General Assembly would meet this year.
They point to his speech at the UN last year, when the US president declared: When we come back here next year, we can have an agreement that can lead to a new member of the United Nations, an independent, sovereign state of Palestine.
In his recent meetings with US government officials, Abbas reminded them of Obamas promise and said the Palestinians were acting in accordance with the US presidents ostensible pledge.
Until this week, Palestinian officials said Abbas was hoping Washington would accept his two conditions for returning to the negotiating table with Israel: a full cessation of settlement construction and Israeli recognition of the June 4, 1967, lines as the basis for peace talks aimed at achieving a two-state solution.
In the past few weeks, Abbass message to Obama and other world leaders has been: Hold me back from going to the UN by making Israel accept the two conditions for resuming the peace talks.
Abbas still hasnt lost hope that the Americans and Europeans will be able to reach some kind of a face-saving compromise that will allow him to climb down from the high tree in a dignified manner. Thats why he still hasnt submitted an official application for full membership in the UN.
The Palestinian leader is hoping daily statements from PA officials about their determination to proceed with the statehood bid will increase pressure on the Americans and Europeans to come up with a formula that can be presented to the Palestinian public as a victory. Abbas knows very well he would be doomed if he dropped the statehood plan without gaining something significant in return.
On the other hand, Abbas and many Palestinians are well aware of the possibility that they would pay a heavy price if they insisted on going ahead with the statehood bid in defiance of the US and many EU countries.
Abbas is hoping the Arab and Islamic countries would compensate the Palestinians for the loss of American and EU funds. In wake of the Arab Spring, he is betting on the Arab and Muslim masses, and not the governments, which have not been financially supportive of the Palestinians over the past two decades.
This is why Abbas, during a visit to Cairo this week, appealed to all Arabs to take to the streets on September 23 to voice support for his statehood bid at the UN. The direct appeal to the Arab masses is an obvious sign that Abbas is not pinning high hopes on the governments and leaders.
But there are still many Palestinians who are worried that Abbas is leading them toward the abyss with his statehood initiative.
The main concern is that the PA would go bankrupt without US and EU funding, leaving more than 150,000 civil servants without salaries. Other Palestinians are also worried about the possibility of a third intifada erupting in the Palestinian territories as tensions mount between Israel and the PA over the statehood bid.
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.
Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal
Wazoo
OUR society today exhibits all signs of decline. The institutional structures of a post-colonial administration have become redundant. They do not respond to the needs of a modern and free democratic polity of the information age.
