Writers often romanticize their subjects.
At times they even manipulate their readers. A book - or any piece of
writing for that matter – is meant to provide a sense of completion.
Sociological explanations are offered to offset the confusion caused by
apparent inconsistency in human behavior. At times a reader is asked to
take a stance, or choose sides.
As peace talks begin, President Obama
should see Budrus, a film that captures a case where Palestinians
borrowed tactics from the civil rights movement.
As defined by the debate, Jan Brewer stands
for telling crazy stories about the Arizona desert being filled with
headless bodies, whereas Goddard stands for the ability to speak in
complete sentences.
QUETTA, Pakistan - At least 73 people
were killed and over 160 others injured when a suicide bomb blast hit
Pakistan's southwest city of Quetta on Friday, local Urdu TV channel
Dunnya quoted police sources as saying.
Six Portuguese men are sentenced to up to
18 years in jail after being found guilty of multiple charges of sexual
abuse at a state-run children's home.
I'm still confused as to how our legal
system operates sometimes. I know I'm sounding like a Plaxico apologist,
and I'm OK with that. Burress, in my opinion, is not a criminal.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi slammed Senate
Republicans Thursday for failing to reauthorize funding for a subsidized
jobs program that has created 240,000 jobs in 37 states.
The Republic of Ireland linked its move
to its concerns about the use of forged Irish passports in the killing
of a top Hamas militant in Dubai in January - allegedly by Israeli
agents.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai has condemned an
air strike by Nato-led forces which he said killed 10
election campaign workers, although US officials maintained it was
aimed at an
Islamist leader.
A movement which began in the late 1940s
stretching to the late 1950s and was nothing more than a witch-hunt
orchestrated in conjunction with fears of a gullible public gave birth
to McCarthyism, the act of making serious but unsubstantiated charges
against people or ideologies.
The chief Palestinian negotiator in peace
talks with Israel vehemently denied late Friday reports that the two
sides would meet again in the West Bank on Monday after kicking off a
new round of negotiations in Washington.
WASHINGTON – When the ceremonies cease, when the speech-making ends,
when the chandeliers in ornate halls are turned off, when Egyptian
President Hosni Mubarak and Jordan’s King Abdullah II go home, and when
US President Barack Obama’s attention is diverted elsewhere, Prime
Minister
Binyamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President
Mahmoud Abbas will be left – just the two of them – alone in a room.
Even now as Presbyterian leaders
prophetically issue statements calling for the U.S. to end its military
aid to Israel unless Tel Aviv stops it settlement activities in occupied
land that belongs to Palestinians, they might want to recall what Jack
Nelson-Pallmeyer wrote in his book “The Politics of Compassion.”
In spite of Tuesday's terror attack and
its tragic consequences, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas remains a
partner for peace. Over the next few days we will, of course, hear the
same old slogans bandied about: "There is no Palestinian partner," or
better yet, "Yasser Arafat could have made peace but didn't want to;
Abbas may or might not want to conclude a peace with Israel, but he
cannot."
Even as Hurricane Earl weakened Thursday,
East Coast residents scrambled to ready themselves ahead of its arrival.
Earl is now a strong Category 2 storm.
LAHORE,
Pakistan (Reuters) - The International Monetary
Fund will give Pakistan $450 million in emergency
flood
aid, providing some relief for a government overwhelmed by the
disaster and facing renewed militant violence.
HAWIJA: Even as President Barack Obama
was announcing the end of combat in Iraq, American soldiers were sealing
off a northern village early Wednesday as their Iraqi partners raided
houses and arrested dozens of suspected insurgents.
Johannesburg — A surplus production of
maize, Malawi's staple food, will not prevent at least one million
people from being food insecure, a forecast that has not pleased
President Bingu wa Mutharika.
Musicians don't often end up on FBI watch
lists, but the Last Poets did, thanks to their links with the Black
Panthers. Dorian Lynskey looks back at a time when pop and politics
collided as never before.
A group of Iranian journalists
sympathetic to the world view of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has
launched
barackobama.ir, a website set up to address "an Iranian viewpoint on
Barack Obama's opinions."
Beijing - All the crew members aboard a
Chinese fishing boat that sank after colliding with a cargo ship in the
waters off the west coast of the Republic of Korea (ROK) on Wednesday
remained missing despite a day-long search-and-rescue work by Chinese
task force and ROK Coast Guard.
However, the American political class'
finest moment came in September 2008 when the financial greed machinery
of American investment houses went tits up. The Republican and
Democratic parties, major corporations, and manufacturers of US opinion
came together in one of the greater bipartisan efforts in modern US
history. There was nothing to do, they all agreed, but buy up $700
billion in "toxic asset" investments. "Otherwise," they prophesied, the
world would end. Meaning that the ongoing national Ponzi scheme they
have always sold to the American people as the US economy, would finally
crash.
Banks don't want to recognize losses by having to put homes on the
market at foreclosure-sale prices, but they don't want to encourage
borrowers to quit making payments either, so, O'Toole believes, they
randomly foreclose on some people to prevent widespread "moral hazard."
Arab News - In Rome, the Libyan leader
came out with ideas that, had they been uttered by European or American
politicians, would have resulted in them condemned as being racist. He
said that faced with millions of Africans who wanted to emigrate to
Europe, the European Union should pay Libya $6.3 billion to help keep
them out and prevent a “black Europe.”
On the eve of the silliest peace talks in
history, the big question is this. What makes Obama's envoy George
Mitchell, a negotiator of high repute, say there is 'no role' for Hamas?
Seven years later, President Obama's
announcement will not "officially" end the war in Iraq nor present and
future combat missions. There will be more deaths and destruction, more
bloodshed and unexpected, horrific outcomes. There will never be a
triumphant entry, at least for U.S. troops, like Canadian soldiers
experienced. For most Iraqis, the war will never end. For more than
one-hundred thousand, the war has already ended. The futility of the
U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq will last for generations.
Three
hostages were rescued from the Discovery Channel building after
police shot suspect James Lee, who had staged protests against the
company in the past.
MAPUTO, (AP) —
Police opened fire Wednesday on stone-throwing mobs who were
protesting rising prices, killing seven people as the U.N. noted that
international
food prices have risen to their highest in two years — a level that
could see unrest spread.
Saudi officials have refuted claims that
a sponsor in Riyadh hammered nails into the body of his Sri Lankan
housemaid as punishment, saying the allegations are baseless.
Government has put contingents of the
Rwanda Defense Force (RDF) serving under UN-backed peacekeeping
operations on standby for pull out, if the UN publishes a report
alleging that Rwandan troops
WASHINGTON: U.S. textile groups and cotton farmers on Wednesday
strongly objected to proposed new trade benefits for Pakistan, saying
the United States should send aid to the flood-ravaged country, not U.S.
jobs.
Bank profits jumped 21 percent last
quarter to nearly $22 billion, the highest level in three years, as
banks put away less money to cover future losses, fewer borrowers fell
behind on payments and lenders paid the least for their funds in perhaps
50 years, a government report released Tuesday shows.
On August 25, Yale University ended a
three day global anti-Semitism 'crisis' conference promoting the notion
that Israeli criticism is "anti-Semitic," no matter how justified.
Yitzhak Ames, Tali Ames, Kochava Ben-Haim and Avishai Schindler were
all from Beit Hagai; Netanyahu tells security forces to act "without
constraints against the murderers."
TEHRAN - Supreme
Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei has
advised the Ahmadinejad administration to make life easier for the
people and to make serious efforts to achieve the goals of the 20-Year
Outlook Plan.
In tonight's Oval Office address, President
Obama will declare that "the American combat mission in Iraq has ended,"
according to excerpts from the White House.
"We don't know what will happen, what
will be the reaction of the white and Christian Europeans faced with
this influx of starving and ignorant Africans," Col Gaddafi said.
World exclusive:
As his memoir is published, the man who reshaped British politics talks
frankly to Martin Kettle about Gordon Brown, the Iraq war – and where
Labour went wrong
WASHINGTON - US Commerce Department
announced on Tuesday its decision not to initiate investigation on
allegations that China's currency practices constitute an unfair
subsidy.
The three century old remains of 20,000
African men, women, children former slaves were discovered after the
clean up of the World Trade Center's collapse. Between twenty and thirty
percent of all stolen Africans brought to America as slaves were Muslim.
LAHORE - Chief Minister Mian Shahbaz
Sharif has said that people of Pakistan are thankful to the government
and people of Turkey for taking part in the relief and rehabilitation of
the flood victims. The CM was talking to a Turkish delegation, led by
Deputy Mayor of Istanbul Ismail Hakki, which met him here on Sunday.
[Updated at 7:49 p.m.]
The two men – passengers on United Flight 908 from Chicago O'Hare to
Amsterdam on Sunday night - were arrested Monday at Amsterdam's Schiphol
International Airport after "suspicious items" were found in checked
baggage, U.S. and Dutch authorities said.
"I was at death's door," he told the
director of the left-wing Mexican newspaper La Jornada in an article
published Monday. "I didn't aspire to live, much less anything else."
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates: The imam
spearheading a proposed Islamic center near the site of the Sept. 11
attacks in New York believes the fierce opposition is closely linked to
the US elections in November, according to comments published Monday.
WASHINGTON — Food and Drug Administration
investigators have found rodents, seeping manure and even maggots at the
Iowa egg farms believed to be responsible for as many as 1,500 cases of
salmonella poisoning.
With Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin
Islands and soon the East Coast of the U.S. in its reach, Hurricane
Earl prompted warnings for those areas from FEMA.
On Sunday, a 13-year-old became the
youngest person to die at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway when he fell
off his motorcycle and was run over by a 12-year-old during a race,
raising the question: How old is old enough when it comes to extreme
sports?
TEHRAN -- Iran’s
natural gas flow to Turkey would be resumed within the next seven days
after it was halted because of an explosion on August 25, an official
with the National Iranian Gas Company said here on Monday.
It's not hard to see what Beck has
against "liberation theology." It's the same reason people are often
against "social justice." Both ideas ask us to consider the plight of
the poor.
As for the link between a regime and a
threat, he knows what every Japanese citizen knows. Amano once declared
that he opposes the proliferation of nuclear weapons because he comes
from a country that experienced Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In those days,
it wasn't Iran, but rather the Japanese emperor against the U.S.
government. Regimes mired in trouble, like those afflicted by hubris,
pose threats. These facts apply today to the Iranian regime.
Barack Obama was “incredulous” at what he
was hearing, said one of his top economic advisers. The president had
spent his first year in office overseeing the biggest government bailout
of the financial industry in American history. Together with Federal
Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke, he had kept Wall Street afloat on a
trillion-dollar tide of taxpayer money. But the banks were barely
lending, and the economy was still mired in high unemployment.
(CNN) -- New York cab driver Ahmed
Sharif cannot bring himself to talk about the young man who allegedly
cut his throat and nearly killed him last week, a taxi union
representative said Sunday.
Rwanda says it will reconsider its UN
commitments - including peacekeeping contributions - if a draft report
is published accusing its troops of possible genocidal acts.
ProPublica -- As investors left the
market in the run-up to the meltdown, Wall Street created fake demand,
increasing their bonuses — and ultimately making the crisis worse.
On May 31, I joined some 50 students and
faculty members who gathered outside Ben-Gurion University of the Negev
to demonstrate against the Israeli military assault on the flotilla
carrying humanitarian aid toward Gaza.
France has come under
increasing pressure to stop its
mass expulsions of Roma when a
United Nations
human rights panel added its voice to the chorus of
condemnation.
(CNN) --
A worker was paid for 12 years without ever showing up for work at a
Norfolk, Virginia, agency funded by federal, state and local money,
officials say.
(CNN)
-- Hurricane Danielle, a Category 4 storm, will bring large waves to
Bermuda and will likely cause rip currents along the East Coast of the
United States, the National Hurricane Center said Friday afternoon.
BOSTON — An American
held captive for seven months in North Korea stepped off a plane in
his hometown Friday, looking thin but joyful as he hugged the former
president who had helped win his release and family and friends
surrounded him in a group embrace.
The US warned
Lebanon that if it did not prevent any recurrence of the border-fire
incident that occurred earlier this month, the IDF would destroy the
Lebanese Armed Forces within four hours, Israel Radio cited a report by
Lebanese newspaper A-Liwaa on
Friday.
The inability of the Bush, and now the Obama, administration
to identify the root cause of the economic crisis has prevented effective
responses. Many pundits and politicians claimed that the crisis was caused
by subprime mortgages; their narrative was that failure of marginal
mortgagees caused the recession.
My picture has
graced the Glenn Beck blackboard a number of times over the past year. I
am quite sure that if the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. were alive
today, he would have been on Glenn Beck's blackboard long before I would
have ever been considered.
The soldiers of the US 4th Stryker
Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division hollered as they made their way into
Kuwait. 'We won,' they claimed. 'It’s over.' But what exactly did they
win? And is the war really over?
For all the talk about what a subtle
business the n-word is, the concept of Ebonics is just as tricky. And in
the wake of the theatrically pat culmination of the Dr. Laura drama --
her exiting stage right -- here we are grappling with the Drug
Enforcement Administration sending out a call for Ebonics translators.
The
Fed's latest policy meeting was reportedly the most contentious in
Bernanke's four-and-a-half-year term there, but resulted in a
decision to carry out what has been described "QE-lite". It decided
to reinvest the proceeds of its maturing holdings of mortgage-backed
securities by putting the funds into Treasury bonds.
Netanyahu asks
Putin to stop deal involving sale of advanced P-800 Yakhont supersonic
cruise missiles; Israel considers this weaponry dangerous to its navy
vessels in Mediterranean Sea.
NEW
YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Federal aviation regulators slapped American
Airlines on Thursday with the largest fine in history, charging that the
carrier made thousands of unsafe flights.
Insurgents
killed eight
Afghan policemen in a raid this morning on a checkpoint outside the
northern city of Kunduz, the provincial chief of
police said.
LARNACA - As on other occasions when talk
of peace negotiations filled the air, examples from around the world are
being cited as models for settling the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Nearly 600 Israelis have signed up for a campaign of civil
disobedience, vowing to risk jail to smuggle Palestinian women and
children into Israel for a brief taste of life outside the occupied
West Bank.
The delta is the third-largest wetland in
the world. Farmland and fishing should be a source of income for 31
million inhabitants. However, the oil-saturated water has destroyed most
crops and fish stock.
The prevailing disputation over the right
of Muslim Americans to build a community centre and mosque a short
distance from the site of the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks has
garnered plenty of headlines in the past few days.
A New York City cab driver was attacked
Tuesday evening just after 6 p.m. by a passenger who asked him if he was
Muslim, says the NYPD. A spokesman for a New York City cabbie group
blamed the attack on the proposed construction of an Islamic center near
Ground Zero, the site of the 9/11 World Trade Center terrorist attack,
but police said they were not aware of any link.
The US decision in 2006 to send Ethiopian
troops into Somalia in 2006 was one of the stupidest moves in a very
stupid decade. This week, some of the chickens spawned by that decision
came home to roost.
It may be a mere coincidence, but the
Camp David conference that generated the framework agreement for peace
between Israel and Egypt also began in September (1978 ). It set out to
deal with the core of the conflict between us and Egypt and draft a
framework agreement for a peace treaty.
Like many thousands of Palestinians in
Ramallah, I feel utterly confused by the dishonesty of being railroaded
concerning local boycott of 'settlements' products. Because we—my wife
and I—are committed to the principle and act of boycott, as a means of
resistance, I decided to clarify the primary issues involved, in order
to minimize, as much as possible, daily contradictions. I embarked on
sorting out, systematically, methodically and with clarity, related
major issues.
The possibility of extending, or ending
Israel's moratorium on West Bank settlement construction will be
discussed within the context of upcoming direct Middle East peace talks
between Israel and the Palestinians, a senior U.S. official said Monday.
BEIJING - President Hu Jintao and his
South African counterpart Jacob Zuma on Tuesday raised bilateral ties to
a "comprehensive strategic partnership", opening more avenues to expand
trade and strengthen relations across the board between China and the
largest African economy.
The extreme congestion on the
highway, is a result of maintenance work, necessitated by overloaded
coal trucks that have damaged the road, and a rising demand for coal
in China’s capital.
The day before the Muslim holy month of
Ramadan began, at 2:30 in the morning, workers sent by the Israeli
authorities, protected by dozens of police, destroyed the tombstones in
the last portion of the Mamilla cemetery, an historic Muslim burial
ground with graves going back to the 7th Century, hitherto left
untouched.
The head referee, the president of the
United States, has twisted the arms of his colleagues in the Quartet and
is dragging Abbas to Washington. Barack Obama decided that the
negotiations will be held without any commitment regarding building in
East Jerusalem, and will be opened without even a declaration of
principles stating that the talks will be held on the basis of a general
formula, like peace and security for Israel and a state along the 1967
borders for the Palestinians. It's time to jump into the fountain in
Rabin Square and cheer: The Palestinians have been shafted!
Waking up to a pounding headache after a
bachelorette party, The Daily Beast's Elizabeth Gates chalked it up to
the revelry. Then she found she couldn't speak. Three months later, she
writes about having a major stroke at an unthinkably young age.
JOHANNESBURG — Rwandan and Congolese rebels
gang-raped nearly 200 women and some baby boys over four days within
miles of a U.N. peacekeepers' base in an eastern Congo mining district,
an American aid worker and a Congolese doctor said Monday.
TEHRAN: Iran has suspended three senior
judiciary officials over last year's torture deaths of three imprisoned
anti-government protesters, media reported Monday.
Nairobi — Truly the East African Economic
Community has taken off. You can now move all sorts of goods and
merchandise across the common border without hindrance. Indeed, there is
this lucrative trade item -- the albino.
Like most Americans, I am a descendant of
immigrants and a grateful beneficiary of the opportunities available to
our nation's citizens. My grandparents emigrated from Mexico in the
early 20th century seeking a better life, and they found it working in
the fields and dairy farms of Texas.
From the barred windows of a four storey house string runs across the
narrow main street of Aida Camp, well above head height, to the caged
fence atop the walls of Aida Camp Basic Boys School. Small plastic
Palestinian flags hang down limply from the string.
"Chalk it up to inexperience," Benjamin
Netanyahu suggested, speaking in English - in his MIT lingo - when asked
why, during his first term as prime minister, he gave the defense
portfolio to Yitzhak Mordechai and allowed him to do as he pleased with
the Israel Defense Forces.
In letters to Obama, Medvedev and Ashton,
PA president warns that newly-launched peace negotiations will fail if
Israel does not extend settlement freeze, due to expire on September 26.
WikiLeaks founder and editor Julian Assange
says Swedish authorities reached "the height of irresponsibility" by
issuing an arrest warrant alleging rape against him, then revoking it
less than a day later.
BUSHEHR – The Bushehr
nuclear power plant was launched on Saturday as engineers loaded the
first of 163 fuel roads into the reactor under the supervision of the
International Atomic Energy Agency.
All 33 Chilean miners trapped underground
since a tunnel collapse 17 days ago are alive, Chile's President
Sebastian Pinera says, after a note is sent up to the surface via a
remote probe.
As I look at what passes for responsible
economic policy these days, there’s an analogy that keeps passing
through my mind. I know it’s over the top, but here it is anyway: the
policy elite — central bankers, finance ministers, politicians who pose
as defenders of fiscal virtue — are acting like the priests of some
ancient cult, demanding that we engage in human sacrifices to appease
the anger of invisible gods.
Seeing that some political leaders and
citizens are extremely upset over President Barack Obama's assertion of
having no regrets about vocally supporting an Islamic mosque near Ground
Zero in New York, it is very important to recall what Thomas Jefferson
said at his inaugural address, and how he differentiated between
principles and opinions concerning the future of America.
As fueling of Bushehr nuclear power plant begins, Iranian president
warns that a strike on Iran would be answered with "harsh and painful"
retaliation; US: Plant "not a proliferation risk."
An arrest warrant for Wikileaks founder
Julian Assange on rape accusations is abruptly cancelled by Swedish
authorities just hours after it was issued.
In order to
understand President Barak Obama's present Middle East policy, it is
necessary to review his initial agenda for "change" and to understand
the pragmatic American political mentality that always looks at the
world from two basic points of view
U.S. Secretary of State Clinton said
Netanyahu and Abbas will meet with President Obama on Sept. 1, before
formally resuming direct negotiations the following day.
The president has been criticized for his
passivity on race. But he seems to have no problem speaking up on issues
that affect Muslims. Will African Americans continue to give him a pass?
The controversy over
the right of Muslim Americans to build community center and mosque a
short distance from the site of the September 11, 2001, terrorist
attacks is both strange and outright inappropriate.
After the World Trade Center towers fell,
a stripper named Chris went to volunteer in the recovery effort for the
Red Cross. Nearly 10 years later, she dances just down the street from
Ground Zero at the Pussycat Lounge.
"They stopped me and told me to remove my
clothes because the way I was dressed, it is as if I wanted to walk
naked," the 21-year-old told IRIN/PlusNews. "I was afraid and I did as
they told me - I removed my clothes and they started mocking me."
(CNN) --
Scientists at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution said they
detected a plume of hydrocarbons in June that was at least 22 miles long
and more than 3,000 feet below the surface of the Gulf of Mexico, a
residue of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Haiti hip-hop
star Wyclef Jean is not on the list of approved candidates who satisfy
legal requirements to run in the country's November 28 presidential
election, an electoral official said on Thursday.
I get that the progressives, and the
activists, and the young people who voted for the first time, and the
disillusioned voters who returned to the polls in '08, feel slighted by
the president.
Nicholas Kristof is not the kind of
person you would expect to be a slave owner. As a columnist on that most
august of newspapers, the New York Times, he belongs to an elite within
an elite, the embodiment of journalistic seriousness.
CARACAS,
Venezuela – A Peruvian
court said Wednesday that it had revoked the parole of Lori
Berenson, the New Yorker imprisoned in the 1990’s on charges of
collaborating with a Marxist revolutionary
group.
UNITED NATIONS —
Iran took its case against the United States to the United Nations
on Wednesday and strongly condemned the top US military chief for saying
military action remains a possibility if the country develops nuclear
weapons.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said on
Wednesday the U.S. Army has expressed willingness to discuss the online
whistleblower’s request for help in reviewing classified documents from
the Afghan war and removing information that could harm civilians.
NEW
DELHI: Three
Indian soldiers, part of the UN peace-keeping force in
Congo, were killed and seven seriously injured when a militia outfit
armed with spears, machetes and other
weapons attacked their post at Kirumba camp in North Kivu province
of the central
African nation in the early hours of Wednesday.
BEIJING - The United States does not view
China as a threat and Washington is in talks with Beijing on cooperation
in Latin America, long considered America's backyard, a senior US
official said on Wednesday.
For many, outside the
United States, the term terrorism is difficult to understand, because it
is only applied to unfriendly groups. When friendly groups or nations
threaten to attack others, or actually attack other nations, Westerners
tend to label the attack as self-defense. For instance, when Israel
attacks Palestine it is labeled the right of self-defense.
Measures designed to benefit Jewish school-leavers applying for places
in Israeli higher education at the cost of their Arab counterparts
have been criticized by lawyers and human rights groups.
John Paul says, at first, he couldn't
believe his own scientific data showing toxic microscopic marine
organisms in the Gulf of Mexico. He repeated the field test. A colleague
did his own test. All the results came back the same: toxic.
A federal judge throws out piracy charges
against six Somali men accused of attacking a US Navy ship off the coast
of Africa, although other charges stand.
BEIJING - A Pentagon report on China's
"secretive" drive to transform itself into a major military power, was
brushed aside by Chinese experts on Monday as "unprofessional", guilty
of ambiguity and inconsistencies.
The Federal
Reserve (Fed) believes that lower interest rates influence planned
investment. The influence of lower interest rates on planned investment is
only realized when businesses perceive viable demand for their products. Thus,
there must be strong aggregate demand in the goods market from consumers for
lower interest rates to influence investment.
Today's GOP
argument is that spending and tax increases by the Obama administration are
bad for the country. Their argument, however, is disingenuous and
purposely for political gain. It is also partly deceptive, because the Obama administration has not increased taxes.
Gross domestic
product (GDP) is the summation of spending on consumption, investment,
government, and net export. Net export is the difference between exports
and imports. GDP, therefore, is the income earned by Americans. Clearly,
a reduction in any of the components of GDP would reduce national
income.
The problem
that confronts the U.S. Economy is how to maintain full employment or
how to produce the required domestic income to maintain full employment.
Clearly, if current income produces unemployment, more income is
necessary to produce full employment.
Republicans
and Democrats have different narratives of the employment-unemployment
dilemma. The Republicans believe that deregulating industry and reducing
taxes stimulate the economy and reduce unemployment. The Democrats
believe that government spending stimulates the economy and reduces
unemployment. Neither method, however, can cause more money to be
produced. Thus, they're unlikely to improve employment and the income of
the middle class.
If you are
black, you should consider the perils of working for the Obama
administration, since any criticism by conservatives would lead to you
being thrown under the bus. Shirley Sherrod, a black USDA official,
described an incident that occurred 24 years ago to support racial
unity.
Israel's left should support the idea of
the European Union's taking effective responsibility for the development
of the Gaza Strip, even if Lieberman is the one who proposed it. Anyone
who wants to view this idea as European neocolonialism is free to do so.
John B.
Taylor's 2009 article, “The need to return to a monetary framework” is
enlightening. He sets out to trace the increases in excess reserves
created by the Federal Reserve (Fed) between mid-September 2008 and
December 31, 2008. He showed that the increases were due to the Fed
purchase of securities and providing loans to “certain sector and
institutions.”
We often hear
pundits and politicians assert that businesses drive the economy and
that they are not investing because proposed regulations cause
uncertainty. However, it is not the businesses that drive the economy,
rather it is consumers' income (wealth) and taste (preferences) that
drive the economy.
If Israel values its relations with
Ankara, an apology for the loss of life is the least it can do to begin
to amend relations. In the meantime, the Turkish government’s response
to Israel’s stubbornness will be closely watched in the days ahead, as a
measure of not only its own commitment to justice in Gaza but also as a
measure of its own growing influence in the region.
It is time for
Democrats, the administration, and the American public to understand the
game. If the Fed does not increase the money supply, output and
employment will not increase.
It
appears that the Fed is willing to sacrifice full employment for low inflation
or it could well be that Fed policy is to sacrifice Mr. Obama and the Dems
politically; by withholding money from the public it ensures continued high
levels of unemployment and political loses for the Dems in November.
According to
CNN, Gary Faulkner, a white American detained in Pakistan for hunting bin
Laden is on his way back to the United States with no charges filed against
him.
Data from the Federal Reserve (Fed) indicates that
banks are holding excess reserves, see graph below.
Reserves
are bank cash held in the bank vaults, ATM machines, and at the Fed.
Bank reserves are used to cover deposit withdrawals. The Fed requires
banks to hold reserves against specified deposits liabilities. However,
some
banks also hold excess reserves. Excess reserves are used to
provide loans to customers.
Helen Thomas, the legendary White House reporter, said
that Jews in Israel should get out of Palestine and go back to where they came
from Germany, Poland, America, not Africa (Exodus).
Israel prime minister is
attempting to put a spin on another terror act by Israel. He claimed that
Israel had “no
other choice” but to stop the flotilla of ships. Such a spin,
however, is unacceptable, particularly given the history of the holocaust.
Would a claim that the Nazis had no choice be acceptable? Of course not.
It is time for President Obama to tell British
Petroleum (BP) that their effort to stop the gushing crude oil leak in
the Gulf of Mexico is insufficient and incompetent. Thus, the Federal
Government should identify alternative competent service providers to
cap the leak. Moreover, it should indicate to BP that all cost,
including incidental, incurred as a result of their negligence will be
BP’s responsibility.
British Petroleum (BP)
vacillating approach to containing the crude oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico is
a testament to implementation incompetence. BP tries an approach and if it
does not work the first time, it is quickly set aside. Experienced engineers
would not have so quickly set aside the original box that would have covered
the leak.
Shameful, British
Petroleum (BP) had no viable contingency plan in the event of a blowout. However, BP is not alone. Projects, particularly those that have
the potential to cause environmental disasters, should be authorized
only if a robust feasibility study is performed and reviewed by
experts. The feasibility study should include all known potential
safety and environmental hazards and remedies to mitigate identified
hazards.
It may be possible to
use large funnels equipped with vacuum pumps to skim the crude oil from
the ocean surface. The surface crude would be vacuumed into floating
tankers.
The immigration
debate is often viewed contemporaneously. However, it should be viewed
from a wider historical perspective. From a historical perspective the
first non natives to the “new world” were illegal emigrants.
Nonetheless, the natives helped them survive the harsh environment, but
their good deeds did not go unpunished.
Martinsburg, WV
– The West Virginia mining disaster is the worst since 1972, when 91
miners were killed in a fire at the Sunshine Mine in Kellogg, Idaho.
President Obama wants thorough investigation into a deadly explosion at
a West Virginia coal mine that killed 29 people.
Replacing
Justice Stevens
The press and
pundits are proposing candidates for replacing Justice Stevens.
However, among potential candidates there is no mention of African,
Asian, or Arab Americans. Rather, they propose more Jewish
candidates, although the Court already has two sitting Jewish
justices. And, since 1916 the Court has had seven Jewish justices.
It would not be fair to add a third Jewish justice the existing
Court.
President Obama
should strongly consider changing the Court’s racial and ethnic
balance. The Court should be representative of the American
population.
The Jethro
Project recommends Professors Sherrilyn Ifill from the University of
Maryland and Charles Ogletree from Harvard University.
Depending on the position of the leaks and the damaged piping, BP could
attempt to lower a steel structure that would cover the area of the
mangled leaking pipe. The steel structure would be equipped with a
flexible hose connected to floating tanker, see figure below.
The decision of
the Republiklan
governor of Virginia to celebrate and recognize April as
Confederate History month is a painful reminder of where the Republican
Party stands in reference to brown and black people.
The claim by the Vatican that journalists are
spreading petite gossip about the Pope appears to be a defensive
mechanism. However, denial and evasion of sexual abuses by priests will
not remedy the problem or remove the stain.
Dr. Hagi Ben-Artzi, the
brother-in-law of Israel’s Prime Minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, claims that
President Obama is anti-Semite and that American Jews who voted for Obama
are not pro-Israel
The media, economists, or
policy makers seldom discuss the effects of monetary policy on the economy.
Similarly,
Ryan Grim from Huffington
Post noted that they seldom discuss the effects of war spending on the
deficit. Such avoidance of discussing the effects monetary and war spending
policies on the economy should be troublesome to the average citizen.
According to Federal
Reserve chairman Bernanke, the recession is abating, but the job market
remains weak. Bernanke said he is worried about the long-term impact of the
recession on workers’ skills and wages.
The Democrats won the
election, but the Republicans control the agenda. What does this outcome
tells us about the Democrats? It indicates that their capacity to bring
about results is highly questionable, as well as their ability to set the
proper priorities.
Politicians and pundits
often talk about job creation. However, seldom, if ever, they describe the
mechanism responsible for job creation. Some Democrats believe that fiscal
stimulus (government spending) is the answer to job creation. Some
Republicans adhere to a different type of fiscal stimulus, tax cuts. And,
many pundits argue that spending restraints will lead to economic
prosperity.
Bertocco’s 2005 paper
on “The Role of Credit in a Keynesian Monetary Economy” is interesting
and could be helpful in understanding effective demand. Bertocco in
discussing Keynes notes that a monetary economy is a system in which the
presence of fiat money radically changes the nature of exchange and the
characteristics of the production process. Fiat money has no intrinsic
value and is not produced by labor.
Building robust administrative capacity is important in the delivery of
services to constituents. However, administrative capacity requires
political will and vision, as well as, shared goals and measurable
metrics that optimize performance. It also requires an activist role in
investment and training, and industrial and trade policies. The balanced
scorecard is a mechanism that could be used to facilitate citizens and
government goal setting and to assess accountability and performance.
It is
Wrong to Charge the Missionaries
Haiti it is wrong
to charge the missionaries. Deport them and move on. Haiti has more
pressing problems and needs to show mercy. It is unlikely that the
American missionaries are kidnappers; it is more likely that they
were thinking as Americans.
The Jethro Project recommendations is to deport them
and let them return to the United States.
In a slow US economy, the
average retail price of regular gasoline has increased significantly since
February of 2008. It has increased by almost one dollar.
It is imperative to improve
the safety record of the Washington DC transit system. The system has
suffered a string of worker and passenger fatalities and injuries. Often
organizations with safety problems are plagued by internal systemic problems
that can only be solved by improving internal administrative capacity.
On December the 9th of last semester while most Howard students were
finishing their classes and finals for the Fall it was revealed to the
press that five young American men were arrested in Pakistan for
suspicions of “links to terrorism.” Among those five was Ramy Zamzam, a
Howard University dental student.
Bernanke needs to
explain why the Federal Reserve under his watch allowed the M1 money
stock to remain flat from 2003 until the fourth quarter of 2008.
Obama won the presidency
with votes from the young, minorities, women, independents, and hardcore
democrats. However, once in office he forgot his constituency and became an
advocate of bipartisanship. Additionally, he adopted many policies from the
Bush administration.
As long as the U.S.
government continues to use disjointed databases, its ability to “connect
the dots” will be impaired. Database systems associated with government
agencies are, for most part, unable to communicate
across agencies, and even within agencies.
Al-Qaeda is a shadow
movement with an anti Western bent. The structure of Al-Qaeda, if one
exists, is not well known. It appears, however, that the intended, or
unintended, strategy is to use small groups of extremists in unstable
nations to launch attacks on Western nations, or on any nation for that
matter. In doing so they lure Western military responses.
According to CNN, on
Thursday, December 31, 2009 a U.S. official vowed vengeance for the attack
on a U.S. base in Afghanistan. Vengeance, however, is the major contributor
in the cycle of violence and terror.
