Friday 18 February 2011

USAID closes Venezuelan subversion headquarters

Transfers illegal anti-Chavez shenanigans to Miami

13 February 2011 CARACAS Venezuela — When Russell Porter, the director of USAID’s Ofice of Transition Initiatives (OTI) division, which is dedicated to injecting liquid funds into resolving “political crises” to Washington’s favor, first visited Venezuela in 2002, his task was “evaluating the political situation” to determine how USAID could better help the nation towards a “democratic transition”.

The board of the faith-based development organization rejected the idea. It sent them to Alberta’s tar sands instead.

“I remember saying, ‘They’ll kill us — that will be considered very political,’ ” recalls Mary Corkery, Kairos’ passionate executive director. “The churches said, ‘This is our work. Our work is inspired by faith to tell the truth. It’s a development issue if it’s far away. It’s a political issue if it’s at home. Or if it offends anyone.’ ”

Think it’s a stretch to compare Canada to Nigeria? A government that forges documents, that makes things up, that smothers dissenting opinions, that accuses the media of lying.

That Oda is the minister overseeing international development makes the whole scene all the more surreal. Our government is funding groups in Afghanistan and Haiti now, teaching them about good governance.

“This is what happens in the countries we work in,” a friend of mine working for a development agency told me confidentially. We have become precisely what we contend with overseas. —715 words.

Why Bradley Manning is a patriot, not a criminal

'Washington is clearly intent on destroying this young Army private and then putting him away until hell freezes over. It should not be this way.'

Peak oil now? Leaked cables suggest Saudis running low

2 February 2011 —

The Chinese carried out further tests as recently as last year, however, leading to further protests from Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of State, secret documents show.

Beijing justified its actions by accusing the Americans of developing an “offensive” laser weapon system that would have the capability of destroying missiles before they left enemy territory.

The disclosures are contained in the latest documents obtained by the Wikileaks website, which have been released to The Telegraph. They detail the private fears of both superpowers as they sought mastery of the new military frontier. — 980 words.

15 February 2011 —

From cramped one-room quarters, co-owners and cooks Cui Jicheng and Zhang Huawei dish out rice and vegetables, noodles and dumplings to hungry customers sitting at plastic tables along the adjacent sidewalk, or into plastic bags for takeaway. Their most expensive dish is 12 yuan, or $1.82 (U.S.); the cheapest is six. — 824 words.

The latest U.S. housing figures show that 34.3 per cent of all single-family homes in the Seattle area are negative equity mortgages where the home is worth less than the amount owing on the mortgage, according to Zillow.com, an online real estate database and marketplace.

That's up from 23 per cent a year ago and higher than the national average, which is 27 per cent. — 580 words.

17 February 2011 —

Who, after all, are former Prime Minister Mir Hossein Mousavi and former House Speaker Mehdi Karrubi, the two opposition leaders who continue to insist that the 2009 election giving President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad a second term was rigged or stolen?

Are Mousavi and Karrubi the noble “democrats” as they are portrayed in the U.S. press or are they brazen political operatives seeking to claim through disruption in the streets what they could not achieve at the ballot box? As disturbing as the scene in the Iranian parliament was, are there explanations for this unappealing fury? — 4,172 words.

17 February 2011 — Political unrest in the Arab world and elsewhere is supposedly being caused by the actions of none other than … Federal Reserve chairman Ben S. Bernanke!

That is ridiculous, but still, I’ve been getting correspondence from readers insisting that Mr. Bernanke is responsible. You see, quantitative easing leads to rising food prices, which leads to riots, which … O.K., there are a lot of broken links in that silly chain. Let’s take a look at food and commodity prices to discover what’s really going on.

Credit where credit is due:

Fear not the Muslim Brotherhood bogeyman By Juan Cole TruthDig.com   15 February 2011 — The hysteria in American media about Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood is not only ignorant and demagogic, it is hypocritical.   The United States has actively promoted Muslim Brotherhood branches in other countries when it suited its purposes, including in Afghanistan and Iraq. Moreover, the Turkish and Indonesian cases of democratic transition in the Muslim world should have taught us something about how Muslim fundamentalist parties are themselves transformed in a democratic setting. — 980 words.

17 February 2011 — While there will undoubtedly have to be additional popular struggle in Egypt to ensure that the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak leads to real democracy, the ouster of the dictator is by any measure a major triumph for the Egyptian people and yet another example of the power of nonviolent action.

18 February 2011 — Fearing an Egyptian-style inferno, Bahrain’s security forces have moved aggressively to douse a political brush fire that burned for several days in the capital. At least five people were killed and hundreds injured when the protest camp set up in Manama’s Pearl Square was levelled early Thursday morning.

Dakota Sailor, 18, a high school senior in Carl Junction, Mo., says risks linked with energy drinks aren't just hype.

Sailor had a seizure and was hospitalized for five days last year after drinking two large energy drinks — a brand he'd never tried before. He said his doctor thinks caffeine or caffeine-like ingredients may have been to blame. — 829 words.