Arsenio.
AND THE THIRD ANGEL FOLLOWED THEM, SAYING WITH A LOUD VOICE, IF ANY MAN WORSHIP THE BEAST AND HIS IMAGE, AND RECEIVE HIS MARK IN HIS FOREHEAD, OR IN HIS HAND. *** REVELATION 14:9
Arsenio.

By Daniel Burke
Sunday, April 13, 2008; B02
Shortly after Pope Benedict XVI's election in 2005, President Bush met with a small circle of advisers in the Oval Office. As some mentioned their own religious backgrounds, the president remarked that he had read one of the new pontiff's books about faith and culture in Western Europe.
Save for one other soul, Bush was the only non-Catholic in the room. But his interest in the pope's writings was no surprise to those around him. As the White House prepares to welcome Benedict on Tuesday, many in Bush's inner circle expect the pontiff to find a kindred spirit in the president. Because if Bill Clinton can be called America's first black president, some say, then George W. Bush could well be the nation's first Catholic president.
This isn't as strange a notion as it sounds. Yes, there was John F. Kennedy. But where Kennedy sought to divorce his religion from his office, Bush has welcomed Roman Catholic doctrine and teachings into the White House and based many important domestic policy decisions on them.
"I don't think there's any question about it," says Rick Santorum, former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania and a devout Catholic, who was the first to give Bush the "Catholic president" label. "He's certainly much more Catholic than Kennedy."
Bush attends an Episcopal church in Washington and belongs to a Methodist church in Texas, and his political base is solidly evangelical. Yet this Protestant president has surrounded himself with Roman Catholic intellectuals, speechwriters, professors, priests, bishops and politicians. These Catholics -- and thus Catholic social teaching -- have for the past eight years been shaping Bush's speeches, policies and legacy to a degree perhaps unprecedented in U.S. history.
"I used to say that there are more Catholics on President Bush's speechwriting team than on any Notre Dame starting lineup in the past half-century," said former Bush scribe -- and Catholic -- William McGurn.
Bush has also placed Catholics in prominent roles in the federal government and relied on Catholic tradition to make a public case for everything from his faith-based initiative to antiabortion legislation. He has wedded Catholic intellectualism with evangelical political savvy to forge a powerful electoral coalition.
"There is an awareness in the White House that the rich Catholic intellectual tradition is a resource for making the links between Christian faith, religiously grounded moral judgments and public policy," says Richard John Neuhaus, a Catholic priest and editor of the journal First Things who has tutored Bush in the church's social doctrines for nearly a decade.
In the late 1950s, Kennedy's Catholicism was a political albatross, and he labored to distance himself from his church. Accepting the Democratic nomination in 1960, he declared his religion "not relevant."
Bush and his administration, by contrast, have had no such qualms about their Catholic connections. At times, they've even seemed to brandish them for political purposes. Even before he got to the White House, Bush and his political guru Karl Rove invited Catholic intellectuals to Texas to instruct the candidate on the church's social teachings. In January 2001, Bush's first public outing as president in the nation's capital was a dinner with Washington's then-archbishop, Theodore McCarrick. A few months later, Rove (an Episcopalian) asked former White House Catholic adviser Deal Hudson to find a priest to bless his West Wing office.
"There was a very self-conscious awareness that religious conservatives had brought Bush into the White House and that [the administration] wanted to do what they had been mandated to do," says Hudson.
To conservative Catholics, that meant holding the line on same-sex marriage, euthanasia and embryonic stem cell research, and working to limit abortion in the United States and abroad while nominating judges who would eventually outlaw it. To make the case, Bush has often borrowed Pope John Paul II's mantra of promoting a "culture of life." Many Catholics close to him believe that the approximately 300 judges he has seated on the federal bench -- most notably Catholics John Roberts and Samuel Alito on the Supreme Court -- may yet be his greatest legacy.
Bush also used Catholic doctrine and rhetoric to push his faith-based initiative, a movement to open federal funding to grass-roots religious groups that provide social services to their communities. Much of that initiative is based on the Catholic principle of "subsidiarity" -- the idea that local people are in the best position to solve local problems. "The president probably knows absolutely nothing about the Catholic catechism, but he's very familiar with the principle of subsidiarity," said H. James Towey, former director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives who is now the president of a Catholic college in southwestern Pennsylvania. "It's the sense that the government is not the savior and that problems like poverty have spiritual roots."
Nonetheless, Bush is not without his Catholic critics. Some contend that his faith-based rhetoric is just small-government conservatism dressed up in religious vestments, and that his economic policies, including tax cuts for the rich, have created a wealth gap that clearly upends the Catholic principle of solidarity with the poor.
John Carr, a top public policy director for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, calls the Bush administration's legacy a "tale of two policies."
"The best of the Bush administration can be seen in their work in development assistance on HIV/AIDS in Africa," says Carr. "In domestic policy, the conservatism trumps the compassion."
And other prominent Catholics charge the president with disregarding Rome's teachings on the Iraq war and torture. But even when he has taken actions that the Vatican opposes, such as invading Iraq, Bush has shown deference to church teachings. Before he sent U.S. troops into Baghdad to topple Saddam Hussein, he met with Catholic "theocons" to discuss just-war theory. White House adviser Leonard Leo, who heads Catholic outreach for the Republican National Committee, says that Bush "has engaged in dialogue with Catholics and shared perspectives with Catholics in a way I think is fairly unique in American politics."
Moreover, people close to Bush say that he has professed a not-so-secret admiration for the church's discipline and is personally attracted to the breadth and unity of its teachings. A New York priest who has befriended the president said that Bush respects the way Catholicism starts at the foundation -- with the notion that the papacy is willed by God and that the pope is Peter's successor. "I think what fascinates him about Catholicism is its historical plausibility," says this priest. "He does appreciate the systematic theology of the church, its intellectual cogency and stability." The priest also says that Bush "is not unaware of how evangelicalism -- by comparison with Catholicism -- may seem more limited both theologically and historically."
Former Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson, another evangelical with an affinity for Catholic teaching, says that the key to understanding Bush's domestic policy is to view it through the lens of Rome. Others go a step further.
Paul Weyrich, an architect of the religious right, detects in Bush shades of former British prime minister Tony Blair, who converted to Catholicism last year. "I think he is a secret believer," Weyrich says of Bush. Similarly, John DiIulio, Bush's first director of faith-based initiatives, has called the president a "closet Catholic." And he was only half-kidding.
Daniel Burke is a national correspondent for Religion News Service.
Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/11/AR2008041103327_pf.html
These things have I spoken unto you, that ye should not be offended.
They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service.
And these things will they do unto you, because they have not known the Father, nor me.
John 16: 1-3.
A Research Paper
Presented To
Air Force 2025
by
Col Tamzy J. House
Lt Col James B. Near, Jr.
LTC William B. Shields (USA)
Maj Ronald J. Celentano
Maj David M. Husband
Maj Ann E. Mercer
Maj James E. Pugh
August 1996
2025 is a study designed to comply with a directive from the chief of staff of the Air Force to examine the concepts, capabilities, and technologies the United States will require to remain the dominant air and space force in the future. Presented on 17 June 1996, this report was produced in the Department of Defense school environment of academic freedom and in the interest of advancing concepts related to national defense. The views expressed in this report are those of the authors and do not reflect the official policy or position of the United States Air Force, Department of Defense, or the United States government.
This report contains fictional representations of future situations/scenarios. Any similarities to real people or events, other than those specifically cited, are unintentional and are for purposes of illustration only.
This publication has been reviewed by security and policy review authorities, is unclassified, and is cleared for public release.
Chapter
Figure
Table
1 - Operational Capabilities Matrix
We express our appreciation to Mr Mike McKim of Air War College who provided a wealth of technical expertise and innovative ideas that significantly contributed to our paper. We are also especially grateful for the devoted support of our families during this research project. Their understanding and patience during the demanding research period were crucial to the project's success.
In 2025, US aerospace forces can "own the weather" by capitalizing on emerging technologies and focusing development of those technologies to war-fighting applications. Such a capability offers the war fighter tools to shape the battlespace in ways never before possible. It provides opportunities to impact operations across the full spectrum of conflict and is pertinent to all possible futures. The purpose of this paper is to outline a strategy for the use of a future weather-modification system to achieve military objectives rather than to provide a detailed technical road map.
A high-risk, high-reward endeavor, weather-modification offers a dilemma not unlike the splitting of the atom. While some segments of society will always be reluctant to examine controversial issues such as weather-modification, the tremendous military capabilities that could result from this field are ignored at our own peril. From enhancing friendly operations or disrupting those of the enemy via small-scale tailoring of natural weather patterns to complete dominance of global communications and counterspace control, weather-modification offers the war fighter a wide-range of possible options to defeat or coerce an adversary. Some of the potential capabilities a weather-modification system could provide to a war-fighting commander in chief (CINC) are listed in table 1.
Technology advancements in five major areas are necessary for an integrated weather-modification capability: (1) advanced nonlinear modeling techniques, (2) computational capability, (3) information gathering and transmission, (4) a global sensor array, and (5) weather intervention techniques. Some intervention tools exist today and others may be developed and refined in the future.
| DEGRADE ENEMY FORCES | ENHANCE FRIENDLY FORCES |
| Precipitation Enhancement | Precipitation Avoidance |
| - Flood Lines of Communication | - Maintain/Improve LOC |
| - Reduce PGM/Recce Effectiveness | - Maintain Visibility |
| - Decrease Comfort Level/Morale | - Maintain Comfort Level/Morale |
| Storm Enhancement | Storm Modification |
| - Deny Operations | - Choose Battlespace Environment |
| Precipitation Denial | Space Weather |
| - Deny Fresh Water | - Improve Communication Reliability |
| -- Induce Drought | - Intercept Enemy Transmissions |
| Space Weather | - Revitalize Space Assets |
| - Disrupt Communications/Radar | Fog and Cloud Generation |
| - Disable/Destroy Space Assets | - Increase Concealment |
| Fog and Cloud Removal | Fog and Cloud Removal |
| - Deny Concealment | - Maintain Airfield Operations |
| - Increase Vulnerability to PGM/Recce | - Enhance PGM Effectiveness |
| Detect Hostile Weather Activities | Defend against Enemy Capabilities |
Current technologies that will mature over the next 30 years will offer anyone who has the necessary resources the ability to modify weather patterns and their corresponding effects, at least on the local scale. Current demographic, economic, and environmental trends will create global stresses that provide the impetus necessary for many countries or groups to turn this weather-modification ability into a capability.
In the United States, weather-modification will likely become a part of national security policy with both domestic and international applications. Our government will pursue such a policy, depending on its interests, at various levels. These levels could include unilateral actions, participation in a security framework such as NATO, membership in an international organization such as the UN, or participation in a coalition. Assuming that in 2025 our national security strategy includes weather-modification, its use in our national military strategy will naturally follow. Besides the significant benefits an operational capability would provide, another motivation to pursue weather-modification is to deter and counter potential adversaries.
In this paper we show that appropriate application of weather-modification can provide battlespace dominance to a degree never before imagined. In the future, such operations will enhance air and space superiority and provide new options for battlespace shaping and battlespace awareness.1 "The technology is there, waiting for us to pull it all together;"2 in 2025 we can "Own the Weather."
Scenario: Imagine that in 2025 the US is fighting a rich, but now consolidated, politically powerful drug cartel in South America. The cartel has purchased hundreds of Russian-and Chinese-built fighters that have successfully thwarted our attempts to attack their production facilities. With their local numerical superiority and interior lines, the cartel is launching more than 10 aircraft for every one of ours. In addition, the cartel is using the French system probatoire d' observation de la terre (SPOT) positioning and tracking imagery systems, which in 2025 are capable of transmitting near-real-time, multispectral imagery with 1 meter resolution. The US wishes to engage the enemy on an uneven playing field in order to exploit the full potential of our aircraft and munitions.
Meteorological analysis reveals that equatorial South America typically has afternoon thunderstorms on a daily basis throughout the year. Our intelligence has confirmed that cartel pilots are reluctant to fly in or near thunderstorms. Therefore, our weather force support element (WFSE), which is a part of the commander in chief's (CINC) air operations center (AOC), is tasked to forecast storm paths and trigger or intensify thunderstorm cells over critical target areas that the enemy must defend with their aircraft. Since our aircraft in 2025 have all-weather capability, the thunderstorm threat is minimal to our forces, and we can effectively and decisively control the sky over the target.
The WFSE has the necessary sensor and communication capabilities to observe, detect, and act on weather-modification requirements to support US military objectives. These capabilities are part of an advanced battle area system that supports the war-fighting CINC. In our scenario, the CINC tasks the WFSE to conduct storm intensification and concealment operations. The WFSE models the atmospheric conditions to forecast, with 90 percent confidence, the likelihood of successful modification using airborne cloud generation and seeding.
In 2025, uninhabited aerospace vehicles (UAV) are routinely used for weather-modification operations. By cross-referencing desired attack times with wind and thunderstorm forecasts and the SPOT satellite's projected orbit, the WFSE generates mission profiles for each UAV. The WFSE guides each UAV using near-real-time information from a networked sensor array.
Prior to the attack, which is coordinated with forecasted weather conditions, the UAVs begin cloud generation and seeding operations. UAVs disperse a cirrus shield to deny enemy visual and infrared (IR) surveillance. Simultaneously, microwave heaters create localized scintillation to disrupt active sensing via synthetic aperture radar (SAR) systems such as the commercially available Canadian search and rescue satellite-aided tracking (SARSAT) that will be widely available in 2025. Other cloud seeding operations cause a developing thunderstorm to intensify over the target, severely limiting the enemy's capability to defend. The WFSE monitors the entire operation in real-time and notes the successful completion of another very important but routine weather-modification mission.
This scenario may seem far-fetched, but by 2025 it is within the realm of possibility. The next chapter explores the reasons for weather-modification, defines the scope, and examines trends that will make it possible in the next 30 years.
National Council on Drug Abuse offers training for ministers May 20, 2008 Kingston, Jamaica Nigel Coke/ANN Staff |
Dr. Wendel Abel, head of the department of psychiatry at the University of the West Indies, urged churches to open their doors as counseling centers in a speech to Adventist health leaders in Kingston on May 18. His speech was part of a drug addiction conference sponsored by the Adventist Church in East Jamaica. [photos: Nigel Coke/ANN]
Oneil Smith, a regional director for the National Council on Drug Abuse, offers training for ministers who would serve as counselors for people in need.
Seventh-day Adventist Church leaders in Jamaica are welcoming a call from health officials to train pastors in counseling individuals as the nation faces continued social problems.
Speaking at a drug addiction seminar hosted by the Adventist Church in Kingston May 18, Dr. Wendel Abel, head of the department of psychiatry at the University of the West Indies (UWI), said the Adventist Church in the Caribbean island nation is an ideal organization to offer such counseling because of its human resources and its message of health and temperance.
"Open your doors and operate as counseling centers," Abel told Adventist health leaders gathered at the Kencot Adventist Church. "Those that embrace Christianity are better able to overcome addiction. This is so because personality problems are deep in the heart of the problem of drug addiction."
A representative for the National Council on Drug Abuse offered assistance to help the church through training.
"We have a structured program of training and we are willing to partner with the church in its efforts to fight drug addiction in our society, said Oneil Smith, the council's regional director for the country's eastern region.
The three-day training would include basic counseling, referrals, stress management, the processes of addiction and in-depth analysis of the five most commonly abused substances.
Church leaders said the offer will complement the church's goal launched last year for its congregations to serve as wellness centers.
"We welcome the offer by the NCDA and will put plans in place for the training of our pastors and volunteers," said Pastor Milton Gregory, Health Ministries director for the Adventist Church in the West Indies.
Surveys indicate drug abuse is one of the biggest problems facing elementary school students. A 2006 national surveyed revealed that 33 percent of students used alcohol before the age of 10. Drug use is a root cause of disciplinary problems in schools, health leaders said.
The Adventist church in Jamaica recently launched the Jamaica Chapter of the International Commission for the Prevention of Alcoholism and Drug Dependency (ICPA) in line with one of its strategic issues of Healthy Lifestyle. Founded in 1952, the ICPA is a nonsectarian, nonpolitical organization placing the spotlight on the science of alcoholism and other drug dependencies. It also seeks to reveal the impact of such dependencies upon the economic, political, social, and religious life of the nation and points out effective preventive actions.
There are nearly 227,093 Adventists in Jamaica worshiping in some 600 churches. Nearly 1 out of every 12 people in Jamaica is an Adventist.
Source: Adventist News Network
Source: http://news.adventist.org/data/2008/1211299664/index.html.en
1I saw the LORD standing upon the altar: and he said, Smite the lintel of the door, that the posts may shake: and cut them in the head, all of them; and I will slay the last of them with the sword: he that fleeth of them shall not flee away, and he that escapeth of them shall not be delivered.
2Though they dig into hell, thence shall mine hand take them; though they climb up to heaven, thence will I bring them down:
3And though they hide themselves in the top of Carmel, I will search and take them out thence; and though they be hid from my sight in the bottom of the sea, thence will I command the serpent, and he shall bite them:
4And though they go into captivity before their enemies, thence will I command the sword, and it shall slay them: and I will set mine eyes upon them for evil, and not for good.
5And the Lord GOD of hosts is he that toucheth the land, and it shall melt, and all that dwell therein shall mourn: and it shall rise up wholly like a flood; and shall be drowned, as by the flood of Egypt.
6It is he that buildeth his stories in the heaven, and hath founded his troop in the earth; he that calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out upon the face of the earth: The LORD is his name.
7Are ye not as children of the Ethiopians unto me, O children of Israel? saith the LORD. Have not I brought up Israel out of the land of Egypt? and the Philistines from Caphtor, and the Syrians from Kir?
8Behold, the eyes of the Lord GOD are upon the sinful kingdom, and I will destroy it from off the face of the earth; saving that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob, saith the LORD.
9For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth.
10All the sinners of my people shall die by the sword, which say, The evil shall not overtake nor prevent us.
11In that day will I raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen, and close up the breaches thereof; and I will raise up his ruins, and I will build it as in the days of old:
12That they may possess the remnant of Edom, and of all the heathen, which are called by my name, saith the LORD that doeth this.
13Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes him that soweth seed; and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt.
14And I will bring again the captivity of my people of Israel, and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof; they shall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them.
15And I will plant them upon their land, and they shall no more be pulled up out of their land which I have given them, saith the LORD thy God.
Landing in Seattle after a long flight from Texas, I was about to join the exit scrum when the pilot informed us there were five soldiers on board, ending a three-day odyssey home from Iraq. Could we let them pass?
What followed was prolonged applause by all, and a startling reminder to some – oh, are we still at war?
Not only still at war, but deeper than ever. It was one thing for the Iraq war to pass an inglorious five-year landmark in March, longer than any other American conflict except the Vietnam War. But the cost now looks like it will exceed all wars except World War II — with a price tag that could near $3 trillion.
The Iraq war has already cost twice as much, in inflation-adjusted dollars, as World War I, and 10 times as much as the Persian Gulf war, according to a new book by Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz and Harvard professor Linda Bilmes. This is in addition, of course, to the more than 4,000 American lives lost, 30,000 wounded and the psychic blows that will ripple through every town that sent a young person off to fight.
Yet, for its prolonged clutch on our treasury and blood, no war as been so out-of-sight, so stage-managed to be painless and invisible. We’re supposed to shop, to spend our stimulus checks, to carry on as if nothing has happened — or is happening. Every now and then we get to rise at a stadium or pause on an airplane. Some sacrifice.
It would have been more fitting for us on that plane to stand aside while a flag-draped coffin was unloaded. At least then, we would get a moment to wonder what it’s like to put a 19-year-old son in a grave, to lose a sister, a spouse, to see war as something more than a parlor game of neo-cons.
In a democracy, wars should be felt by the decision makers — all of us. It starts at the top.
So, in 1942 President Franklin Roosevelt said, “This will require, of course, the abandonment not only of luxuries but of many other creature comforts.” President Bush made a sacrifice – he gave up golf as an act of solidarity with families at war. The man who has probably taken more vacations than any other American president, who goes on showy mountain bike rides while his Veterans Administration shamefully mistreats broken warriors, who cut taxes while burdening a generation with this overseas cancer, is at ease with his conscience.
“I don’t want some mom whose son may have recently died to see the commander in chief playing golf,” he said in a bizarre interview with Politico last week. “And I think playing golf during a war sends the wrong signal.”
He then went on, in the same interview, to do his imitation of Dr. Evil from the Austin Powers movies. No wrong signal there.
In every way, this president has tried to hide the war. The press chafes because photos of flag-draped coffins are forbidden. But that’s nothing compared to how this administration is trying to turn the public’s eyes away from the pain of the people who feel it most directly, the soldiers and their families.
Suicide rates among returning veterans are soaring. And the administration’s response? Cover up the data. An e-mail titled “Shh!” surfaced earlier this month from Dr. Ira Katz, a top official at the V.A. The note indicated that far more veterans were trying to kill themselves than the administration had let on. It speaks for itself.
“Our suicide prevention coordinators are identifying about 1,000 suicide attempts per month among the veterans we see,” Katz wrote, in a note not meant for the general public. “Is this something we should address ourselves in some sort of release before someone stumbles upon it?”
Senator Patty Murray, a Democrat of Washington, who has made veterans affairs her specialty, was furious. “They lied about these numbers,” Murray told me. “It breaks my heart. Soldiers tell us that they were taught how to go to war, but not how to come home. You hear about divorces, binge-drinking, post-traumatic stress, suicide. And the reaction from the president is part of a pattern from the very beginning to show that this war is not costly or consequential.”
Murray is the daughter of a disabled World War II veteran. During her college years, while other students were protesting, she volunteered at a veterans hospital. The odds are, she said, at least one of those five soldiers we applauded on my return plane will suffer severe mental trauma from the war. A recent Rand Corporation study said as much, noting that that 300,000 veterans who served in either Iraq or Afghanistan are plagued by major depression or stress disorder.
“Look what we do when there’s a natural disaster — we show the pictures of the victims and open our hearts,” said Murray. “President Bush should do the same thing with the war.”
But that would require bringing out in the open something that has been hidden since the start of this long war — the truth.
Timothy Egan worked for 18 years as a writer for The New York Times, first as the Pacific Northwest correspondent, then as a national enterprise reporter. In 2006, Mr. Egan won the National Book Award for his history of people who lived through the Dust Bowl, The Worst Hard Time. In 2001, he won the Pulitzer Prize as part of a team of reporters who wrote the series How Race Is Lived in America. Mr. Egan is the author of five books, including "The Good Rain: Across Time and Terrain in the Pacific Northwest," and "Lasso the Wind, Away to the New West." He lives in Seattle.
Source: http://egan.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/05/21/the-invisible-war/
PUERTO RICO, an afterthought trophy for the United States 110 years ago at the end of the Spanish-American War and an island in limbo since, has become an improbable player in the contest between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Its primary on June 1 could bolster Mrs. Clinton’s claim to a majority of the popular vote — the combined tally for all the Democratic primaries and caucuses held across the country over the past six months.
Puerto Rico’s formal role in the process is indeed weighty. Its 63 voting delegates — 55 elected ones and eight superdelegates — at the Democratic National Convention in Denver this summer will outnumber delegations from more than half the states (including Kentucky and Oregon) and the District of Columbia. Yet Puerto Rico does not have a vote in the Electoral College, nor will its 2.5 million registered voters cast ballots for president in November.
How in the world did this happen? From the beginning, the question of Puerto Rico has perplexed the United States. The island was essential to the defense of the Panama Canal, so we did not make it independent, in contrast to two other Spanish possessions we gained in the war, Cuba (which become independent in 1902) and the Philippines (1946). And we judged it foreign in language and culture — and worse, overpopulated — so New Mexico-style Americanization leading to statehood was out of the question.
Similarly, Puerto Ricans have never resolved their relationship with the United States. For almost 50 years after the Spanish-American War, Puerto Rican sentiment was divided between dreams of statehood and of independence. This ambivalence deterred the island from ever petitioning Congress for one or the other. And until mid-century, sporadic outbursts of violent nationalism haunted the scene.
Partly to put such extremism out of business, Congress in 1948 allowed Puerto Rico to elect its own governor and then in 1950 gave it an intricately designed, semi-autonomous “commonwealth” status short of statehood. Two years later, the island adopted its own Constitution, and Congress quickly ratified it.
Puerto Ricans elect their own Legislature, along with the governor. They enjoy entitlements like Social Security, but they do not pay federal income taxes. They retain their own cultural identity (Spanish is the prevailing tongue) but live under the umbrella of the American trade system and the American military. They have been citizens since 1917, but they have no vote in Congress or for the presidency.
The man who brought forth this unique arrangement, which has come to seem permanent, was Luis Muñoz Marín, who dominated Puerto Rico’s politics beginning in 1940. In 1948 he became the island’s first elected governor. He won three more terms and could easily have been “president for life.” A stretch of 116th Street in Manhattan’s Spanish Harlem is named Luis Muñoz Marín Boulevard in his honor.
Muñoz was an eloquent advocate of independence until, faced with daunting statistics at the end of World War II, he concluded that Puerto Rico’s impoverished economy could not support nationhood. So he began packaging his third-way brainchild.
When pitching commonwealth on the mainland, Muñoz — an artist of words and imagery who also enjoyed a drink or two — would observe that Puerto Rico is the olive in the American martini. The phrase went down well in Washington, but Muñoz used different language at home. Neither Congress nor the American courts have ever embraced Muñoz’s Spanish-language phrase for “commonwealth,” universally recognized in Puerto Rico: “estado libre asociado,” or free associated state. Those three words suggested an autonomy (or even statehood or independence) beyond what came to pass. But Muñoz was too popular on the island for that to cause him trouble.
Still, Muñoz always intended to bring “enhanced autonomy” in trade, self-governance, taxation and entitlements to Puerto Rico. But Fidel Castro’s seizure of power in Cuba in 1959 moved Washington’s attention away from the commonwealth.
Michael Janeway, a former editor of The Boston Globe and a professor of journalism and arts at Columbia, is writing a history of the United States and Puerto Rico in the 20th century.
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/22/opinion/22janeway.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin
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Father McShane was emissary for the Orthodox Christian hierarchs attending an ecumenical gathering marking Pope Benedict XVI’s first visit to St. Joseph’s Roman Catholic Church, a historic German parish in Manhattan, on Saturday, April 19. Father McShane also attended the meeting of Catholic university presidents and school superintendents at Catholic University in Washington, D.C.
Other Fordham faculty, staff and students took part in a number of activities during the Pope’s visit, including Masses at St. Patrick’s Cathedral and Yankee Stadium, his meetings with Catholic youth, and the departure ceremony at John F. Kennedy Airport. Amy Uelmen, director of Fordham Law’s Institute on Religion, Law & Lawyer’s Work, gave a reading at the ecumenical gathering at St. Joseph’s.
“I was deeply touched by the reading that had been selected, from Ephesians 4:1-6, which urges us to ‘live in a manner worthy of the call you have received, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another through love, striving to preserve the spirit of unity through the bond of peace,’” Uelman said.
“The Pope’s own presence at this event and at all of the events in our city, was for me a living example of this gentleness, love and capacity to reach out to build promising bridges across so many of our differences,” she added.
Members of the Jesuit community at Fordham attended the Solemn Pontifical Mass for Priests, Deacons and Religious at the Cathedral of Saint Patrick in Manhattan on Saturday. Also on Saturday, 75 Fordham student volunteers assisted at the Pope’s meetings with disabled children and youth seminarians at Dunwoodie. On Sunday, April 20, 35 Fordham student volunteers assisted outside Yankee Stadium at the Solemn Pontifical Mass.
Note: Red Highlights and Bolds added for emphasis by Blogman.
1Thus hath the Lord GOD shewed unto me; and, behold, he formed grasshoppers in the beginning of the shooting up of the latter growth; and, lo, it was the latter growth after the king's mowings.
2And it came to pass, that when they had made an end of eating the grass of the land, then I said, O Lord GOD, forgive, I beseech thee: by whom shall Jacob arise? for he is small.
3The LORD repented for this: It shall not be, saith the LORD.
4Thus hath the Lord GOD shewed unto me: and, behold, the Lord GOD called to contend by fire, and it devoured the great deep, and did eat up a part.
5Then said I, O Lord GOD, cease, I beseech thee: by whom shall Jacob arise? for he is small.
6The LORD repented for this: This also shall not be, saith the Lord GOD.
7Thus he shewed me: and, behold, the LORD stood upon a wall made by a plumbline, with a plumbline in his hand.
8And the LORD said unto me, Amos, what seest thou? And I said, A plumbline. Then said the LORD, Behold, I will set a plumbline in the midst of my people Israel: I will not again pass by them any more:
9And the high places of Isaac shall be desolate, and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste; and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.
10Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, Amos hath conspired against thee in the midst of the house of Israel: the land is not able to bear all his words.
11For thus Amos saith, Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel shall surely be led away captive out of their own land.
12Also Amaziah said unto Amos, O thou seer, go, flee thee away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread, and prophesy there:
13But prophesy not again any more at Bethel: for it is the king's chapel, and it is the king's court.
14Then answered Amos, and said to Amaziah, I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet's son; but I was an herdman, and a gatherer of sycomore fruit:
15And the LORD took me as I followed the flock, and the LORD said unto me, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel.
16Now therefore hear thou the word of the LORD: Thou sayest, Prophesy not against Israel, and drop not thy word against the house of Isaac.
17Therefore thus saith the LORD; Thy wife shall be an harlot in the city, and thy sons and thy daughters shall fall by the sword, and thy land shall be divided by line; and thou shalt die in a polluted land: and Israel shall surely go into captivity forth of his land.
Senator John S. McCain is The Manchurian Candidate
Posted By: A-NON
Date: Thursday, 27 January 2000, 8:25 p.m.
|
Source: http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/archive.cgi?read=1297
Chapter VI
AMERICA is the most democratic country in the world, and it is at the same time (according to reports worthy of belief) the country in which the Roman Catholic religion makes most progress. At first sight this is surprising.
Two things must here be accurately distinguished: equality makes men want to form their own opinions; but, on the other hand, it imbues them with the taste and the idea of unity, simplicity, and impartiality in the power that governs society. Men living in democratic times are therefore very prone to shake off all religious authority; but if they consent to subject themselves to any authority of this kind, they choose at least that it should be single and uniform. Religious powers not radiating from a common center are naturally repugnant to their minds; and they almost as readily conceive that there should be no religion as that there should be several.
At the present time, more than in any preceding age, Roman Catholics are seen to lapse into infidelity, and Protestants to be converted to Roman Catholicism. If you consider Catholicism within its own organization, it seems to be losing; if you consider it from outside, it seems to be gaining. Nor is this difficult to explain. The men of our days are naturally little disposed to believe; but as soon as they have any religion, they immediately find in themselves a latent instinct that urges them unconsciously towards Catholicism. Many of the doctrines and practices of the Roman Catholic Church astonish them, but they feel a secret admiration for its discipline, and its great unity attracts them. If Catholicism could at length withdraw itself from the political animosities to which it has given rise, I have hardly any doubt but that the same spirit of the age which appears to be so opposed to it would become so favorable as to admit of its great and sudden advancement.
One of the most ordinary weaknesses of the human intellect is to seek to reconcile contrary principles and to purchase peace at the expense of logic. Thus there have ever been and will ever be men who, after having submitted some portion of their religious belief to the principle of authority, will seek to exempt several other parts of their faith from it and to keep their minds floating at random between liberty and obedience. But I am inclined to believe that the number of these thinkers will be less in democratic than in other ages, and that our posterity will tend more and more to a division into only two parts, some relinquishing Christianity entirely and others returning to the Church of Rome.
Source: http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER/DETOC/ch1_06.htm
Note:
Democracy in America
by
Alexis de Tocqueville
Volume II
Chapter VI
THE PROGRESS OF ROMAN CATHOLICISM IN THE UNITED STATES
circa 1840.
In a world of very powerful political and corporate leaders, two of the most unlikely people share equal footing- -the pope and the queen. While it seems unlikely that they would share monarchial lineage, status as a head of state, and head of a world religion--but they do. The question is, "Do they share the same goals?"
Monarchial Lineage
While most of us recognize and know of the royal lineage of the British royal family, most are not familiar with the fact that the Papacy is considered to be the oldest monarchy in the world by the world's oldest authority on royalty, The Almanach de Gotha. This makes the Pope a King and the Cardinals of the Church equal to the sons of Kings.
The Almanach de Gotha
In 1999, the Almanach de Gotha was published for the first time since World War II as a result of the reunification of Germany and the restoration of rights to the historic title. From 1763 to1944, The Gotha was the ultimate authority on the reigning and formerly reigning houses of Europe. It has been described as one of the most important books for recognizing and knowing those who are truly royal. If your name is not in this book, you aren't royal! The Almanach primarily focuses on families whose ancestry can be traced back to the Holy Roman Empire (936-1804 A.D.).
In Part One of The Almanach, it lists monarchial families by country. Besides Albania, Belgium, Great Britain, Greece, Monaco, and Norway, to name a few, the Holy See is listed among the "Reigning Sovereign Houses." Since when? What kind of light does this shed on the goals and objectives of the Vaticanare they political or spiritual?
The Almanach describes the monarchy and lineage of the Holy See as follows:
The Holy See--also called the Papal See or sometimes the Holy Apostolic Seeis the See of Saint Peter of Bethsaida in Galilee, Prince of the Apostles, personally established in Rome in the first century of Christianity having received from Jesus Christ the suprema potestas pontificia to be transmitted to his Successors. Besides its dignity of Patriarch of the West, the Universal Primacy of the Petrine See within the Church founded by Christ, as well as its sovereignty have been recognized from earliest times, also before the fall of the Roman Empire. The successors of Saint Peter form the uninterrupted line of Popes until today. The Incumbent of the Holy See is usually considered by Christian sovereign families as the "Father of the Family of Kings"; also since His Holiness represents the oldest Monarchy in Europe.
This information puts the Vatican in a whole new light, even though there is no direct blood line back to Peter since Pope's are elected. The Pope is considered equal with royalty and answers to no one on earth. Amazing! Does this mean each diocese is equal to the fiefdoms of temporal monarchies?
British Royalty - A Comparison
When we talk about someone who is "royal", we must ask ourselves what royalty is. Basically, royals are ranked by how long they have been "king of the hill" (my personal description for their power and position). For example, in Britain, those who are dukes and lords today basically did the king's business five to nine hundred years ago, and, in return, the king granted them titles, lands, and castles that have made them exceedingly rich and powerful. Without such support the kind would not have remained "king of the hill."
Royal Orders
Britain's queen gives gifts (knighthoods) to those whom she wishes to honor and also on the recommendation of the Prime Minister. The Order of the Garter is the most famous and most coveted Order of Knighthood. Others that rank next to it are the Order of the Thistle (the Scottish equivalent to the Order of the Garter) and the Order of Bath (Presidents Ronald Reagan and George Bush and Generals Dwight Eisenhower and George S. Patton have received this award).
Catholic Orders
Similarly, the Catholic Church bestows the same kind of gifts through Pontifical Orders of Knighthood and Orders of Merit, besides countless Cross and Medals. Pontifical Orders of Knighthood are in the personal gift of the Pope.
The Kennedy family received several such titles of recognition. "When Joseph P. Kennedy attended Pius XII's coronation in early 1939 he was created a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Pius IX, which still conferred hereditary nobility by male primogeniture on its grantee and his successors." That same Pope created his wife, Rose, "a papal countess." When John Kennedy Jr. died last year, the hereditary noble rank inherited from his grandfather in 1969.
Head of State
While we are told that the queen, who comes from the world's second oldest monarchy, is not a head of state, her titles suggest otherwise. The sovereign not only appoints the Prime Minister and dissolves Parliament but upon the death of her father George VI, Elizabeth II, became "Supreme Governor of the Church of England, Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, and Head of the Executive, the Legislature, and the Judiciary. All government is, carried out in her name: its ministers are her ministers".
The Vatican is a recognized country and has observer status at the United Nations, making the pope a head of state. As such, the Vatican sends its Ambassador to the United Nations and has actively participated in all of the deliberations and mega-conferences. Other than dissenting on pro-life issues, the Vatican is in full agreement with the goals and objectives of the United Nations which call for the transfer of national sovereignty to the international level, thus confirming speculation that its structure is configured to hold and host a world governmental system.
At a 1999 World Federalist Association conference, its senior vice-president, Dr. John Logue, a practicing Catholic stated, "We must work as hard as we can to build a world commonwealth, a United Nations world commonwealth, which has the power to enact, interpret, and enforce world lawlimited world law on individualson you and on me." He also explained "that Pope Pious XII and John XXIII agree" with the doctrines of the World Federalists for world government.
Leader of a world religion
As part of the titles which are bestowed on the king or queen of England, "Defender of Faith" is one of them as a result of the break by King Henry VIII with the Roman Catholic Church. For years, Prince Charles has made it clear that he wants to be the "Defender of Faiths". Most recently The London Daily Mail confirmed his wishes to have every religion participate in his Coronation. Charles who is a New Ager and pro-Muslim appears to be uniting the eastern religions.
In 1995 the Pope issue an encyclical, "'That They All May Be One' which is dedicated to the search for unity among Christian churches." In commenting on it, Cardinal Edward Cassidy said: "The pope sees the Catholic position on primacy as an essential point of faith...[he] made it clear he would not accept a symbolic papacy without teeth and that Rome would have to hold the primary place among Christians."
Common Goals
In Prince Charles the Sustainable Prince I show and document how the British royal family is the major power behind the United Nations which is as a result of the dream and legacy of Cecil Rhodes. Rhodes not only created the Rhodes Scholarship program (Bill Clinton is our first Rhodes Scholar president) but wanted to find a way to bring America back under British rule through the League of Nations, now the United Nations. This concept, coupled with the understanding that the Holy See considers itself the oldest monarchy in the world, reveals another aspect of the race for who will be supreme "King of the Hill (world)." The British royal family is the hidden power behind the United Nations, while the Holy See wants to unite the world spiritually to support its own political power. Time will tell who gets there first!
| Published: Wednesday, 21 May, 2008, 02:16 AM Doha Time |
| Published: Wednesday, 21 May, 2008, 02:16 AM Doha Time
JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert lost his first court challenge yesterday against a bribery investigation that could force him from office. The Supreme Court, rejecting Olmert’s petition, cleared the way for a lower court to hear preliminary testimony from a US businessman who prosecutors said handed the veteran politician cash-filled envelopes before he became prime minister. Before the three-justice panel announced its decision, police said they planned to question Olmert for a second time, on Friday. Olmert has denied any wrongdoing but said he would resign if indicted in the corruption investigation, a move that could trigger an early election in Israel and likely disrupt US-brokered peace talks with the Palestinians. Police, who first questioned Olmert on May 2, have said he is suspected of taking “significant sums of money from a foreigner or a number of foreign individuals over an extended period of time”. Prosecutors can now summon businessman Morris Talansky to a Jerusalem district court to provide testimony in the case, before the New York resident, who is currently visiting Israel, returns to the US next week. Israel Radio said Talansky would appear in the district court on Sunday. Olmert’s attorneys had tried to persuade the Supreme Court that such testimony, at an early stage of the investigation, would impinge on his right to a fair trial by effectively indicting him before any formal charges were brought. In its ruling, the Supreme Court said it “saw no reason” to overturn the lower court’s decision to hear Talansky’s testimony, noting that as a result prosecutors would be obliged to disclose to Olmert’s attorneys evidence gathered so far. – Reuters |
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has urged the United States to impose a naval blockade on Iran to pressure it to stop its controversial nuclear program, the Haaretz daily reported.
Olmert raised the issue during a meeting in Jerusalem on Tuesday with US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the newspaper said.
"The present economic sanctions on Iran have exhausted themselves," Olmert was quoted as telling the California Democrat.
Asked about the report, Olmert's spokesman Mark Regev would say only: "We do not confirm this information."
Rafi Eitan, a member of Olmert's security cabinet, said he also favoured air travel restrictions against Iran.
"A blockade of maritime and air routes against Iran is a good possibility," Eitan, the minister in charge of pensioners' affairs, told public radio.
"There are voices we hear in Washington that indicate the military option remains open," he added.
Israel, the Middle East's sole if undeclared nuclear power, suspects, like Washington, that Tehran's nuclear program is cover for a drive to develop an atomic bomb, something Iran strongly denies.
© 2008 AFP
Source: http://news.theage.com.au/world/israel-pm-seeks-naval-blockade-of-iran-20080521-2gsy.html