Floatin' Powa News Service: Glow Ball Con Fusion

Genesis
Land of Confusion

Israel is not to blame for unrest in Mideast

To state that the crisis in the Middle East stems only from the "Palestinian problem" obscures the long history of anti-Israeli aggressiveness which started 100 years ago, long before the establishment of Israel in 1948, with pogroms against Jews in Hebron, Safed and Jaffa.

MILIBAND: "Jerusalem should be the capital of the Palestinians and Israel"

Jordan's King Abdullah II pressed on Britain the need for "serious negotiations" between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government and the Palestinians over a two-state solution on Thursday, in a meeting with the British Foreign Secretary.

David Miliband, speaking at a joint press conference following the meeting, expressed Britain's concerns at Israeli plans to demolish scores of houses in East Jerusalem, leaving around 1,500 Palestinians homeless.

Obama signed a waiver Thursday that will allow the Palestinian Liberation Organization to retain its office in Washington D.C.

NYT: New Racism and Its Antecedents

Late last month, Jacques Chirac had a street near the Palestinian government offices in Ramallah named after him — in recognition, the town’s mayor said, of his support for the “Palestinian cause.”

Tens of thousands of Iraqis rally against US

The demonstrators came in response to calls by Muqtada al Sadr, the influential Shiite cleric who's long decried the U.S. military's occupation, but there were also Sunni Muslims in the crowd.

Never forget that Al Sadr still steals oxygen courtesy of the Bush Administration

Iran charges American journalist with espionage

US to Join Iranian Nuclear Talks; Ahmadinejad Seeks ‘Sincerity’
Don't we all?

Iran marks 'national nuclear day' by frightening the bejesus out of everyone

Israel Says Its Ready to Intercept Iranian Nukes
With Arrow-3's....

Obama, Gates take aim at Israel's Arrow-3 missile

Israel's Arrow-3 anti-ballistic missile may be one of the first victims of U.S. President Barack Obama's defense spending cuts. Ynet, the Web site of the respected Tel Aviv daily Yediot Aharonot, reported Monday that U.S. funding for the Arrow-3 program is likely to be eliminated.

However, in compensation, the Obama administration is prepared to help Israel buy the U.S. Navy's Standard Missile 3 anti-ballistic missile system instead, the report said. The SM-3 is built by Raytheon as its primary contractor.

$3b OIC Zakat Fund to target four areas

JEDDAH – An over $3 billion global Zakat and Charity Fund has been announced by the International Zakat Organisation (IZO), an important new charitable body of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC).
The global initiative, which promises to be the largest in the Islamic world, will manage charitable funds to address needy causes, said a press release issued Thursday.
Many of the 57 members of the OIC have already committed themselves to IZO and its initiatives.

Uganda: Southern Range Nyanza to Partner With Saudi Firm

The partnership between Nyanza and Foras Group was initiated during the 2008 Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) meeting in Kampala

All Hail Glow Ball Dhimming!

America is being systematically stripped of its freedom and liberty, and shoved into global secular socialism right before your eyes

Many Americans prefer socialism to capitalism, new poll finds
Sadly many Americans have zero clue what either word actually MEANS...

McCain backs Obama's call to end nuclear weapons

"Concerning President Obama's commitment to the removal of nuclear weapons from the Earth, I certainly support that ambitious goal," McCain told a Tokyo press conference.

Russia Will Retain as Many Nuclear Weapons as Possible

On April 5 President Barack Obama in his speech in Prague, outlined his vision of a nuclear-free world: "This goal will not be reached quickly -perhaps not in my lifetime. It will take patience and persistence. But now we, too, must ignore the voices who tell us that the world cannot change."

SNIP

The notion of significant nuclear disarmament is unacceptable to the Russian military and coming from an American president it is regarded as a cynical ploy to gain total military superiority over the country.

Russia Supports Moldova Vote Probe

Russia stepped up its support Thursday for the government of Moldova in the wake of disputed elections, signaling it is determined to cement its growing influence in the former Soviet republic.

Moldova's ruling Communist Party has accused Romania, a member of the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, of helping plot a failed coup d'etat. Russia has backed calls for an investigation into those claims, saying that the elections are legitimate.

Russia ask EU to protect Moldova sovereignty

Russia warns US against competition for allies

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the United States and Russia should not force former Soviet republics to choose between an alliance with Washington and Moscow, RIA news agency reported on Thursday.

In remarks which appeared to refer to political disturbances in ex-Soviet Moldova, Lavrov said there should be no "hidden agendas" in relations between the United States and Russia.

Government Opponents Protest in Georgia
I guess he was too polite to say "Rose Revolution my ass"

Irakli Alasania, a former ambassador to the United Nations who broke with Mr. Saakashvili over the war, told the crowd that the president had spurned the values of the democratic movement that brought him to power. Mr. Alasania said Mr. Saakashvili exerted authoritarian control over the media, the judiciary and other spheres of society.

Georgia’s President Says He Will Not Give Up Power

Demonstrations of Power for Putin

Moscow. Franz Kafka could have thought up these charges too, but no, these come not from a literary genius but from a lawyer - Russia's Attorney General Juri Chaika. He is accusing the ex-oil magnate Mikhail Khodorkovsky and his business partner Anton Lebedev of having embezzled 350 million tons of crude oil from their subsidiary from 1998 until 2003, almost double Russia's crude oil exports at that time. In addition, they are accused of having legalized half a trillion illegal rubles and 7.5 billion black market dollars through money laundering. The defense counters that most of this was through contracts with government firms and authorities.

Turkmenistan to build 1.5Bln $ Olympic complex

Turkmenistan Seeks Euro Pipeline

Pipeline blast halts Turkmen gas exports to Russia

Gazprom sees no impact on buyers after Turkmen blast

Gazprom Blamed for Blast

Gazprom takes unhealthy interest in Georgian gas distribution system
[this article has now mysteriously vanished from the internet]
UPDATE: As of 1:11 today, it is now back!

Analysis: Gazprom in Azerbaijan

Ever since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, the 15 new emergent nations have all reached out to a greater or lesser extent to Europe and the West. Of the four new nations rimming the Caspian Sea that emerged from the wreckage of the Soviet Union, none pursued a more pro-Western policy than Azerbaijan, but an agreement recently signed in Moscow may be the harbinger of dramatic shifts in Baku's Western-leaning policy.

Gazprom opens first European office in Riga

Eni's Undermining of Human Rights with Gazprom Neft Sale

Shell, Gazprom sign LNG, pipeline supply agreements

Gazprom takes on North America

OAO Gazprom, the world's largest natural gas producer, is making its first "major entry" into the North American natural gas market this year through a deal with Royal Dutch Shell PLC to ship liquefied natural gas to California.

What if Russia or China Cut Off YOUR Electricity?
Tick Tock!

China is ready to partake in developing the Caspian
NATURALLY!

Chinese ambassador to Kazakhstan Chen Gopin said in his interview with Trend Capital in Astana that a number of important agreements on new oil and gas projects will be signed during Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev's upcoming visit to Beijing.

Chinese coming back to Marx amid crisis

The People’s Press – the biggest publishing house for China’s orthodox revolutionary books – reports that Marx’s anti-capitalism opus "Das Kapital" has been selling about 4,000-5,000 copies nationwide a month since last November. That’s a big jump from before the economic crisis, when the book sold well under 1,000 copies per month on average.

Chavez hails Beijing's part in 'new world order'

"We are creating a new world, a balanced world. A new world order, a multipolar world," Chavez said.

Selective abortion causes glut of Chinese males
All the better to build an army with....

Selective abortion in favour of males has left China with 32 million more boys than girls, creating an imbalance that will endure for decades, an investigation released on Friday warned.

Fed Reportedly Tells Banks to Keep Quiet on Stress Tests

So much for that transparency and openness when it comes to the Obama administration’s financial rescue efforts: The Federal Reserve has reportedly told banks to keep quiet when it comes to the results of stress tests done to find out more about their bottom lines, Bloomberg reports.

Wrestling With Capitalist Pigs

In pursuit of money and power, humans are capable of doing contemptible things. But let us not forget that when people behave badly in a capitalist system we end up with the likes of Fuld, Mozilo, and Prince, whereas when government control over the economy is taken to the extreme, we end up with Lenin, Stalin, and Mao.

AIG head’s $3M in Goldman stock raises apparent conflict of interest

Edward Liddy, CEO of government-run AIG, still owns more than $3 million of stock in Goldman Sachs, which has pocketed $13 billion or more of the $170 billion federal officials have spent bailing out the ailing Wall Street insurance giant.

Liddy is managing a company that receives taxpayer dollars to pay other financial firms, with Goldman Sachs the top recipient. While there is no reason to believe Liddy is influencing AIG actions to unfairly benefit Goldman, the situation represents a potential conflict of interest that would never be allowed in a government agency, but is permitted in the strange public-private chimeras like AIG spawned in this age of bailouts.

Fear & ReFUSION in the Bayou:

Today, Governor Bobby Jindal announced that a total of $18.8 million in Homeland Security Grant Funding will be awarded to enhance law enforcement, fire service, and search and rescue capabilities throughout the state. Governor Jindal said the grant funds will be put towards three areas – a statewide Urban Search and Rescue System, Fusion Center & Criminal Database Technology and homeland security funding for local law enforcement and parish governments.

DOJ charges former valve executives with bribery

The US Department of Justice charged six former executives of a Southern California valve manufacturer with conspiracy to bribe foreign government officials to secure contracts.

DOJ officials said the contracts resulted in $46.5 million in profits for the company, which was not identified beyond being based in Orange County, Calif.

The indictment accused the six defendants of being involved in the alleged bribery conspiracy during 1998-2007.

DOJ said payments were made to officials of China Petroleum Materials and Equipment Corp., PetroChina, China National Offshore Oil Corp., the Malaysian national oil company Petronas, and National Petroleum Construction Co., which is based in the UAE, as well as to several electricity and nuclear power firms. The payments are said to be in violation of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

On 'State Secrets,' Meet Barack W. Obama:

In February, President Obama's Justice Department quietly argued in a San Francisco court that it was maintaining the same position as President Bush's Justice Department on a case involving detainees trying to sue a private company for its role in their (allegedly) extraordinary renditions. The Obama administration pushed the status quo administration argument by invoking the "state secrets" argument, also a Bush-era fave.

"It is the policy of this administration to invoke the state secrets privilege only when necessary and in the most appropriate cases," said DOJ spox Matt Miller.

Last week, Team Obama did it again. And why wouldn't they?

Attorney General Eric Holder recently said he was reviewing the way the Bush administration used the "state secrets" argument, but "on the basis of the two, three cases that we've had to review so far -- I think that the invocation of the doctrine was correct."

Huh.

That seems a little different from the Obama-Biden campaign website where "The Problem" is described in part as the Bush administration having "invoked a legal tool known as the 'state secrets' privilege more than any other previous administration to get cases thrown out of civil court." Because that's just what the Obama administration tried to do.

Harvard won’t surrender its hypocrisy

Forty years ago today, Harvard University caved to pressure from violent student radicals and banned the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) from campus. The ban continues because Harvard finds the U.S. military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy too offensive to be countenanced.

In those same 40 years, Harvard has hosted at least one terrorist - Yassir Arafat - and the former president of Iran’s terror-sponsoring regime. The latter, Mohammad Khatami, was asked to speak on the eve of 9/11.

Current Harvard policy is to accommodate Muslim fundamentalists who demanded single-sex gym time in the name of Sharia law. They even choked down a $20 million donation from Saudi Sheik Alwaleed bin Talal, who had previously given millions to promote Palestinian suicide attacks.

Yet accommodating ROTC is just too much for Harvard’s delicate ethical constitution to bear?

Sabotage caused phone outage in Santa Clara, Santa Cruz counties

Police say someone intentionally cut an underground fiber optic cable in south San Jose, causing a widespread phone service outage in southern Santa Clara and Santa Cruz counties today that included disruption to 911 emergency phone service.

Thai Protest Blocks Summit Meeting

Fiji's President Scraps Constitution, Assumes Total Control

5.3 @ India/Pakistani Border

SoCal quake swarm continues near San Andreas Fault

The Temptations
Ball of Confusion