Friday, January 02, 2009

St. Birgitta & EndTimesNews


EndTimesNews


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Refer people to this channel if you want to wake them up toward God, world events and prophecies coming true.END TIMES PROPHECIES AND POWERFUL REVELATIONS FROM GOD AT THIS SITE!http://www.saintbirgitta.com/



Jesus warns you to not raise up children in the last days, because the deception will be great. Its irresponsible wanting to raise up children in this world. Why would you want to raise up children in an ungodly world where they must go in school and learn ungodly teachings, where they will meet ungodly friends, where they will want to play video games, lusting for girls, watching worldly movies and series, go to parties and embrace the lusts and pleasures of this world? This is a path straight to Hell; today will most people go to Hell.[Matthew 24:19] And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days![Matthew 7:13-14] "Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it."Christ command you not to raise up children in the last days, so who knows best, you or God? Sex is only allowed for procreation, and he command you not to have children in the last days, which then means that you must live in chastity. But this is not how the world works and what the Church teaches, which is why everybody has sex out of Lust, and that is why most people enter Hell.These verses below proves that you cannot have sex out of lust and pleasure that defiles the honorable marriage bed in marriage as most people falsely claim, but only for the reason of procreation, (procreation that in the end times are not allowed, so then you must live in total chastity). Either you acknowledge the words of God, or deny them.[Hebrews 13:4] Marriage is honourable in all, and the marriage bed kept UNDEFILED: for whoremongers and adulterers God will judge.[Revelation 14:1-5] And no man could learn that song but the hundred and forty and four thousand, which were redeemed from the earth. These are they which were NOT DEFILED WITH WOMEN; FOR THEY ARE VIRGINS. These are they which follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth. These were redeemed from among men, being the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb. And in their mouth was found no guile: for they are without fault before the throne of God.We are searching for willing translators and helpers who wants to spread the powerful revelations and prophecies of saint Birgitta (Bridget) of Sweden. The language can be any language spoken of mankind. Please contact us brothers and sisters to help us spread the wonderful words of our Lord Jesus Christ!





Even if you believe that you don't have to read words of God that will help you, understand that others do. God's words here will save souls, so please help us spread them in any way you can, tell your friends and families about them. If you work in Church or go to Church, print out free copies for your congregation and give it to them after mass. If you do that God will reward you greatly.


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Note: Illustration of "St. Birgitta" courtesy of http://saints.sqpn.com/stb07bk1.htm;


^Visit the above site and you'll read about more of her "supposed" prophecies.

The Lesson of Bethlehem


The Lesson of Bethlehem


Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation. Heb. 9:28. At the time of Christ's first advent the priests and scribes of the Holy City, to whom were entrusted the oracles of God, might have discerned the signs of the times and proclaimed the coming of the Promised One. The prophecy of Micah designated His birthplace; Daniel specified the time of His advent. God committed these prophecies to the Jewish leaders; they were without excuse if they did not know and declare to the people that the Messiah's coming was at hand. Their ignorance was the result of sinful neglect....


All the people should have been watching and waiting that they might be among the first to welcome the world's Redeemer. But, lo, at Bethlehem two weary travelers from the hills of Nazareth traverse the whole length of the narrow street to the eastern extremity of the town, vainly seeking a place of rest and shelter for the night. No doors are open to receive them. In a wretched hovel prepared for cattle, they at last find refuge, and there the Saviour of the world is born....


There is no evidence that Christ is expected, and no preparation for the Prince of life. In amazement the celestial messenger is about to return to heaven with the shameful tidings, when he discovers a group of shepherds who are watching their flocks by night, and as they gaze into the starry heavens, are contemplating the prophecy of a Messiah to come to earth, and longing for the advent of the world's Redeemer. Here is a company that is prepared to receive the heavenly message. And suddenly the angel of the Lord appears, declaring the good tidings of great joy....


Oh, what a lesson is this wonderful story of Bethlehem! How it rebukes our unbelief, our pride and self-sufficiency. How it warns us to beware, lest by our criminal indifference we also fail to discern the signs of the times, and therefore know not the day of our visitation.


Maranatha, E. G. W., p.10.


*Bolds and Highlights added for emphasis.

"The Visitation"


Luke 19


1And Jesus entered and passed through Jericho.

2And, behold, there was a man named Zacchaeus, which was the chief among the publicans, and he was rich.

3And he sought to see Jesus who he was; and could not for the press, because he was little of stature.

4And he ran before, and climbed up into a sycomore tree to see him: for he was to pass that way.

5And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up, and saw him, and said unto him, Zacchaeus, make haste, and come down; for to day I must abide at thy house.

6And he made haste, and came down, and received him joyfully.

7And when they saw it, they all murmured, saying, That he was gone to be guest with a man that is a sinner.

8And Zacchaeus stood, and said unto the Lord: Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have taken any thing from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold.

9And Jesus said unto him, This day is salvation come to this house, for somuch as he also is a son of Abraham.

10For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.

11And as they heard these things, he added and spake a parable, because he was nigh to Jerusalem, and because they thought that the kingdom of God should immediately appear.

12He said therefore, A certain nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom, and to return.

13And he called his ten servants, and delivered them ten pounds, and said unto them, Occupy till I come.

14But his citizens hated him, and sent a message after him, saying, We will not have this man to reign over us.

15And it came to pass, that when he was returned, having received the kingdom, then he commanded these servants to be called unto him, to whom he had given the money, that he might know how much every man had gained by trading.

16Then came the first, saying, Lord, thy pound hath gained ten pounds.

17And he said unto him, Well, thou good servant: because thou hast been faithful in a very little, have thou authority over ten cities.

18And the second came, saying, Lord, thy pound hath gained five pounds.

19And he said likewise to him, Be thou also over five cities.

20And another came, saying, Lord, behold, here is thy pound, which I have kept laid up in a napkin:

21For I feared thee, because thou art an austere man: thou takest up that thou layedst not down, and reapest that thou didst not sow.

22And he saith unto him, Out of thine own mouth will I judge thee, thou wicked servant. Thou knewest that I was an austere man, taking up that I laid not down, and reaping that I did not sow:

23Wherefore then gavest not thou my money into the bank, that at my coming I might have required mine own with usury?

24And he said unto them that stood by, Take from him the pound, and give it to him that hath ten pounds.

25(And they said unto him, Lord, he hath ten pounds.)

26For I say unto you, That unto every one which hath shall be given; and from him that hath not, even that he hath shall be taken away from him.

27But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.

28And when he had thus spoken, he went before, ascending up to Jerusalem.

29And it came to pass, when he was come nigh to Bethphage and Bethany, at the mount called the mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples,

30Saying, Go ye into the village over against you; in the which at your entering ye shall find a colt tied, whereon yet never man sat: loose him, and bring him hither.

31And if any man ask you, Why do ye loose him? thus shall ye say unto him, Because the Lord hath need of him.

32And they that were sent went their way, and found even as he had said unto them.

33And as they were loosing the colt, the owners thereof said unto them, Why loose ye the colt?

34And they said, The Lord hath need of him.

35And they brought him to Jesus: and they cast their garments upon the colt, and they set Jesus thereon.

36And as he went, they spread their clothes in the way.

37And when he was come nigh, even now at the descent of the mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen;

38Saying, Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord: peace in heaven, and glory in the highest.

39And some of the Pharisees from among the multitude said unto him, Master, rebuke thy disciples.

40And he answered and said unto them, I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out.

41And when he was come near, he beheld the city, and wept over it,

42Saying, If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes.

43For the days shall come upon thee, that thine enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and keep thee in on every side,

44And shall lay thee even with the ground, and thy children within thee; and they shall not leave in thee one stone upon another; because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation.

45And he went into the temple, and began to cast out them that sold therein, and them that bought;

46Saying unto them, It is written, My house is the house of prayer: but ye have made it a den of thieves.

47And he taught daily in the temple. But the chief priests and the scribes and the chief of the people sought to destroy him,

48And could not find what they might do: for all the people were very attentive to hear him.


Note:

  • Highlights used for Jesus' words;


  • Bolds used for the word that referred to Jesus' visitation to Jerusalem/Israel.


----------------------------)(---------------------------



My observations on Luke 19: The Visitation:


  1. In verse 2: And, behold, there was a man named Zacchaeus, which was the chief among the publicans, and he was rich. Zacchaeus knew who Jesus was (the Messiah), and he ran and climbed a tree for he was short, yet, he wanted to see the Son of God.
  2. In verses 5, then 9: Zacchaeus, make haste, and come down; for to day I must abide at thy house. Jesus said unto him, This day is salvation come to this house, forsomuch as he also is a son of Abraham. Since Zacchaeus recognized Him; Jesus stayed with him the night and blessed (Salvation) him. This was His way of announcing that very few welcomed him, and those that did were rewarded; None of the authorities acknowledged His "Visitation".
  3. In verse 11 through 26 - Jesus told the ones that complained about Him staying with Zachaeus: And as they heard these things, he added and spake a parable, because he was nigh to Jerusalem, and because they thought that the kingdom of God should immediately appear. Jesus told them a parable alluding to His "Visitation". Yet, they did not understand that who was speaking was the prophesied Messiah.
  4. Then in verse 27, Jesus foretold their sentence for neglecting the prophecies, and shunning the Son of God: But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.
  5. Then as they approached Jerusalem (the Capital of the Jews), Jesus sent his Disciples to go fetch a colt for Him. In verse 33 and 34: And as they were loosing the colt, the owners thereof said unto them, Why loose ye the colt? And they said, The Lord hath need of him. Notice that the owners promptly recognized WHO it was that they were saying - the Lord hath need of him. Many recognized Jesus.
  6. As they made their triumphant entrance into Jerusalem: 37And when he was come nigh, even now at the descent of the mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen;
    38Saying, Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord: peace in heaven, and glory in the highest.
    The crowds cheerfully rejoiced that the King that was entering the city was the prophesied Son of God; they praised Him, and God.
  7. In verses 39 & 40, when the some of the Pharisees from among the multitude said unto him, Master, rebuke thy disciples. And he answered and said unto them, I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out. Jesus rebuked them instead for being blind before the Son of God, in spite of all their purported knowledge of the Scriptures; Jesus said that the stones had more wisdom than them.
  8. Then as he looked upon Jerusalem and He wept; He couldn't stand to see the blindness of the same ones that God had for so long favored; Had sent prophets, messengers, had delivered out of bondage in Egypt, and Babylon; Now God sends His, Son and they treated Him with indifference as the verse states: 26For I say unto you, That unto every one which hath shall be given; and from him that hath not, even that he hath shall be taken away from him. Yet, they didn't recognize HIM.
  9. Then Jesus expresses His disappointment: 42Saying, If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes. Jesus continued by telling of the destruction that was in store for Jerusalem (Pharisees, Scribes, rulers, and Teachers), and her blindness: and they shall not leave in thee one stone upon another; because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation.
  10. Jesus entered the Temple and expelled all the thieves that had transformed His Father's House into a Hide-Out for scoundrels, instead of worshiping God and teaching His Word. (This is a prophesy that will be repeated). Jesus then taught daily in the Temple, and many of the chief priests and the scribes and the chief of the people plotted on how they would "kill Him", but, they feared the few that recognized Jesus and listened to every word that proceeded from His mouth.

Today, like during Jesus' short visit to the Earth, many disregard the prophetic signs that herald His soon return. Many totally discredit the Holy Scriptures, others believe, but, say He will not come for yet a while. Meanwhile, the faithful few that recognize that He is coming soon are preparing themselves, their loved ones, and preaching the Three Angels' Message. They acknowledge that Jesus is the Son of God; And if He said that He would return when the signs in the world would so indicate: They are heeding His advice. They love Him above all other "things" in this world.

Like then, soon, Many will weep, and many will rejoice.

"Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!" Amen!


Arsenio.

Thursday, January 01, 2009

The Infamous Firing Squad


Priests Juan Miguel Aldaz and Jose Luis Garrigoitia, pray with prisoner Ramon Reytor, minutes before he was executed in Manzanillo.


Thousands of Cubans have died in front of Castro's infamous firing squad. There was no discrimination, as far as the firing squad was concerned. Young and old, black and white, rich and poor were sent to 'el paredón' (the wall).
Many of those who helped Castro gain power, like Comandantes Ernesto Sori Marin and William Morgan, an American, were among the thousands who were shot.


Read the whole article at link below:


The worst since 1946: How this recession will 'cost 1 in 10 their jobs'


The worst since 1946: How this recession will 'cost 1 in 10 their jobs'

By James Chapman

Last updated at 12:01 PM on 01st January 2009


One in ten workers will be out of a job by the end of the worst recession in Britain since the end of the Second World War, business leaders warn today.

A devastating forecast from the British Chambers of Commerce says unemployment will rise to a peak of 3.1million over the next two years, some 10 per cent of the workforce.

A second report, from retail consultancy Experian, predicts that up to 1,400 retailers will fail this year.

The British Chambers of Commerce report said that economic situation is deteriorating so rapidly that national income will contract by 2.9 per cent in the 15 months to the end of September.

It predicts that in the 2009-2010 financial year, Government borrowing will hit an unprecedented £130billion - 9 per cent of national income.
A separate report, from the Centre for Economics and Business Research, predicts a 2.9 per cent fall in economic activity in 2009 - the steepest single-year drop since 1946.

The forecast from the BCC, which represents more than 100,000 firms, says Britain's budgetary position will remain 'extremely serious' for the next few years.

More...FTSE posts worst year EVER as share prices fall by a third
Bruised investors nurse their wounds as turbulent 2008 ends

In a blow to the Government's flagship policy of increasing debt in an attempt to spend Britain out of recession, it says the need to rein in borrowing as the economy improves 'will dampen UK growth prospects for a considerable period'.

It warns that there is a 'distinct risk' that Britain will be gripped by the nightmare of deflation for the first time since 1960.

By the second half of the year the cost of living will start to shrink.
While high inflation stimulates borrowing, deflation encourages saving and, as a result, discourages consumers and companies from investing and spending.

The report says weaker than expected economic growth and higher unemployment mean the public finances will be in an even worse a state than anticipated.

Scotland and the North West suffered the biggest year-on-year drop in shopper numbers during December with falls of 6.74 per cent and 6.69 per cent respectively.
The report from Experian said that the battered retail sector suffered its worst December for 30 years.
The last minute dash to the shops failed to boost footfall figures for the month, while heavy levels of discounting hit retailers' margins, it said.

Shopper numbers were 3.1 per cent lower during December than they had been in the same month of 2007, despite a massive 12.8 per cent jump in footfall during the last week of the month compared with the same period the previous year.
The group said 2008 had been an 'annus horribilis' for retailers, adding that the 'unprecedented' level of discounting this year had made comparisons with last year extremely difficult.
BCC director general David Frost said: 'I've worked through three recessions and 2009 looks like it will be one of the toughest years I've ever seen for UK plc.

'Some of the strain can be avoided, but only if the Government can address the two key problems of confidence and cash-flow. We must avoid losing viable companies during this downturn.'

Charles Davis, an economist at the the Centre for Economics and Business Research, said: 'We are now on the brink of what we think is likely to be the most difficult year for the United Kingdom real economy since the Second World War.'

He forecast that business failures will rise by 50 per cent in 2009 with at least 32,300 firms going bust.

Mr Davis predicts that the Bank of England would continue cutting interest rates this year and that they would hit 0.5 per cent before the summer.

Shadow Chancellor George Osborne said: 'Labour is bankrupting Britain again. Not only did Gordon Brown fail to fix the roof when the sun was shining, but the evidence is that his approach to the recession is failing too: his policies aren't making things better; they are making them worse.'

Jonathan de Mello, director of Experian, said: 'The last-minute surge in shoppers came as a relief to retailers but for most it was not nearly enough.
'The boost in numbers was driven by massive unprecedented discounting all at the expense of retailer margins.
'There is no disguising the fact that 2008 has been an annus horribilis for the retail sector and there is little prospect of improvement in 2009.'
The Experian group said there had been a 21 per cent year-on-year jump in the number of retail insolvencies during 2008, with high profile casualties such as Woolworths, children's wear group Adams and CD and DVD retailer Zavvi all calling in the administrators.
It predicts a further 440 retail businesses will fail during the first four months of 2009, with a total of 1,400 going under during the year as a whole.
It warned that the large scale of retail failures would have a significant impact on high street returns, affecting everything from investors' yields on rents to revenues for local authorities, as well as the obvious impact on people's jobs and livelihoods.

It added that the fall-out from the difficult trading conditions would also hit retailers' suppliers, manufacturers and service providers and would resonate throughout the entire economy.

Experian estimates that at least one in 10 stores will remain empty during 2009, with high streets in some smaller market towns suffering significantly higher vacancy levels.

Mr de Mello said: 'It has been the most challenging time for retailers for at least 30 years, trading conditions are very tough and the collapses we've seen so far are just the tip of the iceberg.

'At the moment there is too much space in the market and not enough demand. Many retailers are either making no margin or losing money. We anticipate that January will be the toughest for 30 years.'


Flag Frenzy: The More, The Better


At press conferences and photo opportunities these days it seems as if displaying a single American Flag behind a politician, or bureaucrat making a speech is not enough. Now three, four, and as many as six flags are required to deliver the intended message. Isn't it strange that just one U.S. Flag isn't enough to recite a staged, scripted speech? This is not coincidental; there's a method to this madness. It's a if the more flags are displayed behind the person on the spotlight, the more authenticity it gives to the occasion; It makes the message more valid. I believe that the increase of Flags is a means of drumming up faux-patriotism. Can you see when they're pulling the wool over your eyes?
Arsenio.

Was the "Credit Crunch" a Myth Used to Sell a Trillion-Dollar Scam?


Was the "Credit Crunch" a Myth Used to Sell a Trillion-Dollar Scam?
Monday 29 December 2008

»
by: Joshua Holland, AlterNet


US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's plan, also known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program, has been accused of having little oversight and little effect on the financial meltdown. (Photo: Getty Images)
Even as the media continue to repeat the claim that credit has frozen up, evidence has emerged suggesting the entire story is wrong.

There is something approaching a consensus that the Paulson Plan -- also known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP -- was a boondoggle of an intervention that's flailed from one approach to the next, with little oversight and less effect on the financial meltdown.

But perhaps even more troubling than the ad hoc nature of its implementation is the suspicion that has recently emerged that TARP -- hundreds of billions of dollars worth so far -- was sold to Congress and the public based on a Big Lie.

President George W. Bush, fabulist-in-chief, articulated the rationale for the program in that trademark way of his -- as if addressing a nation of slow-witted 12-year-olds -- on Sept. 24: "Major financial institutions have teetered on the edge of collapse ... [and] began holding onto their money, and lending dried up, and the gears of the American financial system began grinding to a halt." Bush said that if Congress didn't give Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson the trillion dollars (give or take) for which he was asking, the results would be disastrous: "Even if you have good credit history, it would be more difficult for you to get the loans you need to buy a car or send your children to college. And ultimately, our country could experience a long and painful recession."

For the most part, the press has continued to echo Bush's central assertion that there's a "credit crunch" preventing even qualified borrowers -- that's the key point -- from getting loans, and it's now part of the conventional wisdom.

But a number of economists are questionioning the factual basis of the credit crunch narrative. Columnist David Sirota recently looked at those claims and concluded that Americans "had been punk'd" -- that "the major claims about a credit crisis that justified Congress cutting a trillion-dollar blank check to Wall Street were demonstrably false," and the threat of a systemic banking crash was used by the Bush administration to overcome popular resistance to the "bailout."

It's a reasonable conclusion; this is an administration that used the threat of thousands of al-Qaida sleeper cells in the United States to sell Congress on the Patriot Act, the specter of mushroom clouds rising over American cities to push through the Iraq war resolution and the supposedly imminent crash of the Social Security system to push for privatizing Americans' retirement savings.

But the question comes down to what they knew and when they knew it. The analyses that suggest the whole credit crunch narrative is false are based on data that lagged behind the numbers that policymakers had available, in real time, back in September. So the question -- probably unanswerable at this point -- comes down to whether or not they looked at the situation and in good faith believed that pumping hundreds of billions of dollars into the banking system would contain the damage and save an economy teetering on the brink of collapse.

What Else Could Be Happening?

Of course, no one disputes the fact that as the economy has tanked, the number of new loans being issued to American families and businesses has plummeted. But is because credit has dried up for qualified borrowers?

Economist Dean Baker doesn't think so. He explains the situation in simple terms: The media, he argues, "are blaming the economic collapse on a 'credit crunch' instead of the more obvious problem that consumers just lost $6 trillion of housing wealth and another $8 trillion of stock wealth." It's a commonsense argument: much of the economic growth of the Bush era existed on paper only, built on the rise of a massive bubble in real estate values rather than growth in productive industries. When all that ephemeral wealth vaporized -- and with the economy shedding jobs like a dog with dermatitis -- consumers stopped buying, and businesses, anticipating a long slowdown, stopped seeking the loans that they might have otherwise tapped to expand their operations.

Whether good borrowers can't get credit from banks because the latter are hoarding cash or lending has stopped because of a drop-off in demand for new loans is not some wonky academic debate; it's of crucial significance. Because if lending to qualified parties has truly frozen, then even if the specific implementation of the Paulson Plan was deeply flawed, its broad approach -- "recapitalizing" banks in various ways, buying up some of their crappy paper and guaranteeing some of their transactions -- is fundamentally sound.

If, on the other hand, the primary problem is that people are broke and maxed out on debt, and firms aren't looking for money to expand, then the kind of massive stimulus package being considered by the Obama transition team and congressional Dems -- largely designed to stimulate demand from the bottom up, with public works projects, tax cuts for working families, aid to tapped-out state and municipal governments and new money for unemployment and food stamps -- is obviously the best approach to take.

Broadly speaking, these are the parameters of the debate in Washington, and that means that properly diagnosing the underlying problem is crucially important.

Is the Credit Crunch a Big Lie?

There's plenty of evidence that Baker's right. He points out that even though mortgage rates have plummeted, the number of applications for new loans has dropped to very low levels and argues it's "the most glaring refutation of the claim that people are unable to get credit." If creditworthy applicants were being denied loans by banks unable or unwilling to lend, Baker explains, "then the ratio of mortgage applications to home sales should be soaring" as qualified homebuyers apply to multiple banks for a loan. "Since there is no notable increase in this ratio, access to credit is obviously not an issue."

Again, this is common sense. Consumer spending drives about 70 percent of the U.S. economy, and in recent years, much of that spending was financed by people taking chunks of home equity out of their properties -- people might have been eating in fancy restaurants, but they were essentially eating their living rooms to do so.

That the American people don't have the appetite to go deeper into debt than they already are in order to make new purchases is hard to dispute. In November, consumer prices across the board fell at a record rate for the second month in a row. And even with mortgage rates plummeting, so many homeowners are "underwater" -- owing more on their homes than they're worth -- that they're unable to refinance because the equity isn't there. Paul Schuster, a vice president at Marketplace Home Mortgage, told the St. Paul Pioneer Press, "What I'm really concerned about is the job picture ... If (people) don't feel good about their jobs, rates aren't going to matter."

The National Federal of Independent Business' November survey of small-business owners found no evidence of a credit crunch to date, concluding that if "credit is going untapped, it's largely because company operators are not choosing to pursue the credit. It's not that companies can't get the extra money, it's that they don't want or need it because of the broader slowdown in economic activity."

The credit crunch narrative -- and the justification for creating Paulson's $700 billion TARP honeypot -- is built on three related assertions: 1) banks, fearing that they'll be unable to meet their own financial obligations, aren't lending money to one another; 2) they're also not lending to the public at large -- neither to firms nor individuals; and 3) businesses are further unable to raise money through ordinary channels because investors aren't eager to buy up corporate debt, including commercial paper issued by companies with decent balance sheets.

Economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minnesota's research department -- V.V. Chari and Patrick Kehoe of the University of Minnesota, and Northwestern University's Lawrence Christiano -- crunched the Fed's numbers in an examination of these bits of conventional wisdom (PDF), and concluded that all three claims are myths.

The researchers found that "interbank lending is healthy" and "bank credit has not declined during the financial crisis"; that they've seen "no evidence that the financial crisis has affected lending to non-financial businesses" and that "while commercial paper issued by financial institutions has declined, commercial paper issued by non-financial institutions is essentially unchanged during the financial crisis." The researchers called on lawmakers to "articulate the precise nature of the market failure they see, [and] to present hard evidence that differentiates their view of the data from other views."

That finding was backed up by a study issued by Celent Financial Services, a consulting firm, again using the Treasury Department's own data. According to a story on the report by Reuters, Celent's researchers concluded that the "data actually suggest world credit markets are functioning remarkably well." Rather than a widespread banking problem, Celent found that the rot was limited to "a few big, vocal banks and industries such as car manufacturing, which would be in difficulty anyway."

There are also some important caveats. Economists at the Boston Federal Reserve responded to the Minnesota Fed's research (PDF), arguing that the use of aggregate data doesn't fully reflect the dysfunction in specific subsectors of the economy, nor does it adequately reflect the decline in new loans.

It's also the case that single-cause explanations for complex crises usually fail to hit the mark. Banks, having fueled the housing bubble (and similar bubbles before that) with the creation of ever-shadier "exotic" securities, are probably erring on the side of caution in writing new loans. They're looking at their balance sheets as quarterly reports approach, and the number of foreign investment dollars coming into the U.S. has declined, meaning that some qualified firms may, indeed, have trouble raising cash in the near future.

Dean Baker, while arguing that "the main story is that people don't have money and therefore want to spend," acknowledged that "some banks are undoubtedly anticipating more write-offs from other loans going bad, so they will hang on to their capital now rather than make new loans." And, as Sirota notes, some of the institutions that are relatively healthy are reportedly holding cash in anticipation of picking up weaker banks on the cheap.

But one thing is clear: the economic crisis may have woken up Washington's political class when it hit the banks, but it remains a product of long-term imbalances in the economy, and the idea that it's primarily a pathology of the banking system in isolation is a misdiagnosis that, if uncorrected, can only result in a longer, deeper and more painful recession than might otherwise be the case.

--------

Joshua Holland is an AlterNet staff writer.



The Muslim Terrorist Apparatus was Created by US Intelligence as a Geopolitical Weapon

Ex-Security Chief Brzezinski's Interview makes clear:The Muslim Terrorist Apparatus was Created by US Intelligence as a Geopolitical Weapon

Le Nouvel Observateur's Interview with Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Jimmy Carter's National Security Adviser

Published 15-21 January 1998
Translated by Jean Martineau

I. Comment: The US & European States are still using Brzezinski's Muslim terrorist strategy!by Jared Israel
II. Interview with Brzezinski
[Posted 6 September 2004]
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- Comments -
Below is our translation of an interview with Zbigniew Brzezinski. It is important for three reasons.

First, it flatly contradicts the official US justification for giving billions of dollars to the mujahideen in Afghanistan in the 1980s, namely that the US and Saudi Arabia were defending so-called freedom fighters against Soviet aggression.

Not so, says Brzezinski. He confirms what opponents have charged: that the US began covert sponsorship of Muslim extremists five months *before* the Soviets invaded Afghanistan. He says that after President Carter authorized the covert action:
"I explained to the president that this support would in my opinion lead to a military intervention by the Soviets."

Second, the interview is instructive concerning so-called "conspiracy theory." To be sure, there are plenty of nutty theories out there. And of course, there are plenty of just plain wrong theories. But as Brzezinski demonstrates, the US foreign policy establishment did, for want of a better word, conspire. Even as they claimed to oppose Muslim extremism, they knowingly fomented it *as a weapon of policy.*
And they lied about what they were doing, pretending they were helping freedom fighters resist an invasion. In other words, deceit on two levels.
One must ask oneself: if the US foreign policy Establishment used Muslim extremism as a weapon once, how can one argue *in principle* that they would not use it again?

We say they *have* used it again; that they have used it continuously; and that we are seeing the fruits of this policy. Most recently we have seen the real essence of the Brzezinski doctrine in the horrendous events this past week in Russia (culminating in the school attack) and Israel (the double bus bombing).
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Lying with dollars
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Brzezinski and his protégé, Zalmay Khalilzad, set up a corporation in 1985, funded by the US congress, to train the mujahideen to sell reporters the lie that the mujahideen were freedom fighters and victims of aggression:
[Excerpt from Associated Press dispatch starts here] My emphasis

Headline: U.S. Provides $500,000 So Afghan Rebels Can Tell Their Story

AP, September 16, 1985, Monday, PM cycle SECTION: Washington Dateline

By JOAN MOWER
WASHINGTON

Guerrillas in Afghanistan are about to get money from the United States government for a public relations campaign intended to bring their struggle against Soviet troops to the world's attention.
The money will train Afghan rebel journalists to use television, radio and newspapers to advance their cause. Reporters will be given mini-cameras to photograph the war inside Afghanistan.
"It is the goal of this project to facilitate the collection, development and distribution of credible, objective and timely professional-quality news stories, photographs and television images about developments in Afghanistan," said a notice in the Federal Register. The program will be overseen by Uncle Sam's own propaganda arm, the U.S. Information Agency. Congress appropriated $500,000 to hire experts and may provide more later.
In making the money available, Congress all but instructed USIA to consider an organization like Friends of Afghanistan, a new group whose board includes former Carter administration national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, known for hard-line anti-Soviet views.
USIA has solicited proposals, due Sept. 25.
Friends of Afghanistan includes other American foreign policy luminaries such as Lawrence Eagleburger, a former undersecretary of state, and Dr. Zalmay Khalilzad, a Columbia University political science professor and some-time paid adviser to the State Department on Afghanistan.
[Note from Jared Israel - Eagleburger played a prominent role in first Bush administration in demonizing the Bosnian Serbs.]
[...]
Afghan rebels, called the Mujahadeen, have been battling 100,000 Soviet troops who have occupied the rugged, mountainous country since December 1979.
[...]
[Excerpt from Associated Press dispatch ends here]
The Associated Press referred to Khalilzad as a "some-time paid adviser to the State Department on Afghanistan." This was in the late summer of 1985. Less than three years later Tass, the Soviet news agency, reported that Khalilzad was delivering the mujahideen an important message from the State Department. Khalilzad told them that the State Department would continue to support them a) only if they could consolidate control of Afghanistan and b) only if they maintained an attitude of implacable hostility to the government in Kabul. In other words the US ordered the mujahideen *not* to make peace:
"'The United States has told the Afghan guerrillas that it would support them in an effort to form a provisional government if they consolidate their control of most of the country and meet other criteria,' the newspaper New York Times today quoted State Department officials as saying. A top State Department official made it clear that the government must oppose 'the soviet-backed regime in Kabul' and said that the USA did not 'accept the legitimacy' of the authorities in Afghanistan. The relevant message was delivered to the rebels in the Pakistani city of Peshawar last week by Zalmay Khalilzad, a special adviser on Afghanistan to under secretary of state Michael H. Armacost..."[-- To Support Afghan Counter Revolutionaries New York; The Russian Information Agency ITAR-TASS, May 6, 1988, Friday]
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Applying the techniques developed in Afghanistan to Bosnia
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Brzezinski's interview has tremendous importance today. According to a Dutch intelligence report on Bosnia, in the early 1990s Pentagon intelligence worked with the Saudis and Iranians to bring weapons and mujahideen terrorists - the 'Afghan Arabs' - into Bosnia to indoctrinate and lead Alija Izetbegovic's Muslim extremists in fighting the Bosnian Serbs. [1]
The same terrorists had been used against the pro-Soviet side in Afghanistan. Once again the media lied, claiming the Bosnian Serbs were fighting to destroy the Bosnian Muslims (i.e., genocide) when they were in fact defending their communities from the mujahideen, and were allied with a large group of moderate Muslims. [2]



This picture appeared in the London Times on December 11, 1995. The caption reads: "One of the Bosnian Army's Muslim brigades marches through Zenica in a demonstration of strength by 10,000 soldiers." Note that according to the Times these 10,000 troops constituted only *one* of "the Bosnian Army's Muslim brigades..."

During the 1990s, pictures like this were as rare as hen's teeth in the Western media. Why? Because they graphically demonstrated that the media was lying when it claimed that the "Bosnian Government" was moderate and multiculturalist and so on.

The white costumes these troops are wearing are the uniforms of Middle Eastern mujahideen, not Yugoslav Muslims. The Bosnian Muslim troops wore them because they had been indoctrinated by Muslim extremists, including mujahideen imported by Iran, Saudi Arabia and other extremist states, with the participation of Pentagon intelligence. In the early part of the Bosnian conflict (up until January 1993) Zalmay Khalilzad, the protégé of Zginew Brzezinski, was in charge of strategic planning at the Pentagon. [3]


In Afghanistan (as Brzezinski proudly states) and then in Bosnia, the US sponsored Muslim terror even as the State Department was officially condemning it. Because ordinary people would never support such a policy, it was sold to the public as support for freedom fighters (Afghanistan) or as defense of abused Muslims (Bosnia.)

By the late 1980s Brzezinski's protégé, Prof. Zalmay Khalilzad, was the top strategist of the Afghan war.

Under the administration of Bush, Sr., Khalilzad was in charge of strategy at the Pentagon. We have substantial evidence that it was under Bush, Sr., not Clinton, that the US began assisting the mujahideen in Bosnia.

So, in both cases, we have Brzezinski's protégé directing the use of Muslim extremism as a weapon against a secular state, with the media misrepresenting the nature of the fight. The Brzezinski Doctrine in action.

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2001: Brzezinski's protégé Zalmay Khalilzad was appointed Senior National Security Director for Southwest Asia, the heartland of Muslim extremist terror...

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Want some food for thought? From May 23, 2001 until November 27, 2003, Prof. Khalilzad was "Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Gulf, Southwest Asia and Other Regional Issues, National Security Council." Southwest Asia covers the area from Pakistan to Saudi Arabia, including Iraq and Iran; it includes most of the Middle East and extends to Georgia. See White House map at
http://www.politicsol.com/terrorism/maps.html

* Khalilzad was in charge of US policy on the ground in Afghanistan before and during the 2001 war. He then personally chose the Afghan government. It was under his watch that the US and Iran cooperated in convening a top level conference to give Afghanistan a government based on Muslim religious law. Now he's Ambassador and Special Envoy to Afghanistan. [4]

* Even while Khalilzad was in charge of Afghanistan he was also the key man on the ground before, during and after the invasion of Iraq. He was in charge of political relations with Iraqi exile politicians and the Iranian and Saudi governments up until the fall 2003. A crucial period.

* His area of official responsibility included Georgia during the period when the US was intensifying the financing and training of the Georgian military. Russia accuses Georgia of aiding the Chechen terrorists.

So Brzezinski has been the key hands-on strategist, the leader on the ground, in a vast area plagued with Muslim extremist terror during most of the so-called war on terror. Oops - did I say Brzezinski? Sorry; I meant Zalmay Khalilzad...

Regarding US-Iranian cooperation to use Muslim extremist terror in Bosnia, see "How the U.S. & Iran have Cooperated to Sponsor Muslim Terror," at
http://emperors-clothes.com/analysis/deja.htm

Also see 'Articles Documenting U.S. Creation of Taliban and bin Laden's Terrorist Network' at
http://emperors-clothes.com/docs/doc.htm

Regarding Brzezinski's protégé Zalmay Khalilzad, see
http://emperors-clothes.com/archive/khalilzad-facts.htm

For more on the calculated creation of a Muslim extremist apparatus in Afghanistan in the 1980s by the US and Saudi Arabia, see the Washington Post's analysis at
http://emperors-clothes.com/docs/anatomy.htm

The Brzezinski interview follows.

-- Jared Israel
Editor, Emperor's Clothes

***

Brzezinski's Interview with Le Nouvel Observateur

Le Nouvel Observateur: Former CIA director Robert Gates states in his memoirs: The American secret services began six months before the Soviet intervention to support the Mujahideen [in Afghanistan]. At that time you were president Carters security advisor; thus you played a key role in this affair. Do you confirm this statement?

Zbigniew Brzezinski: Yes. According to the official version, the CIA's support for the Mujahideen began in 1980, i.e. after the Soviet army's invasion of Afghanistan on 24 December 1979. But the reality, which was kept secret until today, is completely different: Actually it was on 3 July 1979 that president Carter signed the first directive for the secret support of the opposition against the pro-Soviet regime in Kabul. And on the same day I wrote a note, in which I explained to the president that this support would in my opinion lead to a military intervention by the Soviets.

Le Nouvel Observateur: Despite this risk you were a supporter of this covert action? But perhaps you expected the Soviets to enter this war and tried to provoke it?

Zbigniew Brzezinski: It's not exactly like that. We didn't push the Russians to intervene but we knowingly increased the probability that they would do it.

Le Nouvel Observateur: When the Soviets justified their intervention with the statement that they were fighting against a secret US interference in Afghanistan, nobody believed them. Nevertheless there was a core of truth to this...Do you regret nothing today?

Zbigniew Brzezinski: Regret what? This secret operation was an excellent idea. It lured the Russians into the Afghan trap, and you would like me to regret that? On the day when the Soviets officially crossed the border, I wrote president Carter, in essence: "We now have the opportunity to provide the USSR with their Viet Nam war." Indeed for ten years Moscow had to conduct a war that was intolerable for the regime, a conflict which involved the demoralization and finally the breakup of the Soviet Empire.

Le Nouvel Observateur: And also, don't you regret having helped future terrorists, having given them weapons and advice?

Zbigniew Brzezinski: What is most important for world history? The Taliban or the fall of the Soviet Empire? Some Islamic hotheads or the liberation of Central Europe and the end of the cold war?

Le Nouvel Observateur: "Some hotheads?" But it has been said time and time again: today Islamic fundamentalism represents a world-wide threat...

Zbigniew Brzezinski: Rubbish! It's said that the West has a global policy regarding Islam. That's hogwash: there is no global Islam. Let's look at Islam in a rational and not a demagogic or emotional way. It is the first world religion with 1.5 billion adherents. But what is there in common between fundamentalist Saudi Arabia, moderate Morocco, militaristic Pakistan, pro-Western Egypt and secularized Central Asia? Nothing more than that which connects the Christian countries...

***



Source: http://emperors-clothes.com/interviews/brz.htm

The Invasion of Serbian Krajina


The Invasion of Serbian Krajina
by Greg Elich
[Mr. Elich is a freelance scholar who has written extensively about Yugoslavia.]

In early August 1995, the Croatian invasion of Serbian Krajina precipitated the worst refugee crisis of the Yugoslav civil war. Within days, more than two hundred thousand Serbs, virtually the entire population of Krajina, fled their homes, and 14,000 Serbian civilians lost them lives. According to a UN official "Almost the only people remaining were the dead and the dying." The Clinton administration's support for the invasion was an important factor in creating this nightmare.

The previous month, Secretary of State Warren Christopher and German Foreign Minister Klaus Kinkel met with Croatian diplomat Miomir Zuzul in London. During this meeting, Christopher gave his approval for Croatian military action against Serbs in Bosnia and Krajina. Two days later, the U.S. ambassador to Croatia, Peter Galbraith, also approved Croatia's invasion plan. Stipe Mesic, a prominent Croatian politician, stated that Croatian President Franjo Tudjman "received the go-ahead from the United States. Tudjman can do only what the Americans allow him to do. Krajina is the reward for having accepted, under Washington's pressure, the federation between Croats and Muslims in Bosnia." Croatian assembly deputy Mate Mestrovic also claimed that the "United States gave us the green light to do whatever had to be done." (1)

As Croatian troops launched their assault on August 4, U.S. NATO aircraft destroyed Serbian radar and anti-aircraft defenses. American EA-6B electronic warfare aircraft patrolled the air in support of the invasion. Krajina foreign affairs advisor Slobodan Jarcevic stated that NATO "completely led and coordinated the entire Croat offensive by first destroying radar and anti-aircraft batteries. What NATO did most for the Croatian Army was to jam communications between [Serb] military commands...." (2)

Following the elimination of Serbian anti-aircraft defenses, Croatian planes carried out extensive attacks on Serbian towns and positions. The roads were clogged with refugees, and Croatian aircraft bombed and strafed refugee columns. Serbian refugees passing through the town of Sisak were met by a mob of Croatian extremists, who hurled rocks and concrete at them. A UN spokesman said, "The windows of almost every vehicle were smashed and almost every person was bleeding from being hit by some object." Serbian refugees were pulled from their vehicles and beaten. As fleeing Serbian civilians poured into Bosnia, a Red Cross representative in Banja Luka said, "I've never seen anything like it. People are arriving at a terrifying rate." Bosnian Muslim troops crossed the border and cut off Serbian escape routes. Trapped refugees were massacred as they were pounded by Croatian and Muslim artillery. Nearly 1,700 refugees simply vanished. While Croatian and Muslim troops burned Serbian villages, President Clinton expressed his understanding for the invasion, and Christopher said events "could work to our advantage." (3)

The Croatian rampage through the region left a trail of devastation. Croatian special police units, operating under the Ministry of Internal Affairs, systematically looted abandoned Serbian villages. Everything of value - cars, stereos, televisions, furniture, farm animals - was plundered, and homes set afire. (4) A confidential European Union report stated that 73 percent of Serbian homes were destroyed. (5) Troops of the Croatian army also took part, and pro-Nazi graffiti could be seen on the walls of several burnt-out Serb buildings.(6)

Massacres continued for several weeks after the fall of Krajina, and UN patrols discovered numerous fresh unmarked graves and bodies of murdered civilians. (7) The European Union report states, "Evidence of atrocities, an average of six corpses per day, continues to emerge. The corpses, some fresh, some decomposed, are mainly of old men. Many have been shot in the back of the head or had throats slit, others have been mutilated... Serb lands continue to be torched and looted." (8)

Following a visit in the region a member of the Zagreb Helsinki Committee reported, "Virtually all Serb villages had been destroyed.... In a village near Knin, eleven bodies were found, some of them were massacred in such a way that it was not easy to see whether the body was male or female." (9)

UN spokesman Chris Gunness noted that UN personnel continued to discover bodies, many of whom had been decapitated. (10) British journalist Robert Fisk reported the murder of elderly Serbs, many of whom were burned alive in their homes. He adds, "At Golubic, UN officers have found the decomposing remains of five people... the head of one of the victims was found 150 feet from his body. Another UN team, meanwhile is investigating the killing of a man and a woman in the same area after villagers described how the man's ears and nose had been mutilated." (11)

After the fall of Krajina, Croatian chief of staff General Zvonimir Cervenko characterized Serbs as "medieval shepherds, troglodytes, destroyers of anything the culture of man has created." During a triumphalist train journey through Croatia and Krajina, Tudjman spoke at each railway station. To great applause, he announced, "There can be no return to the past, to the times when [Serbs] were spreading cancer in the heart of Croatia, a cancer that was destroying the Croatian national being." He then went on to speak of the "ignominious disappearance" of the Serbs from Krajina "so it is as if they have never lived here... They didn't even have time to take with them their filthy money or their filthy underwear!" American ambassador Peter Galbraith dismissed claims that Croatia had engaged in "ethnic cleansing," since he defined this term as something Serbs do. (12)

U.S. representatives blocked Russian attempts to pass a UN Security Council resolution condemning the invasion. According to Croatian Foreign Minister Mate Granic, American officials gave advice on the conduct of the operation, and European and military experts and humanitarian aid workers reported shipments of U.S weapons to Croatia over the two months preceding the invasion. A French mercenary also witnessed the arrival of American and German weapons at a Croatian port, adding, "The best of the Croats' armaments were German- and American-made." The U.S. "directly or indirectly," says French intelligence analyst Pierre Hassner, "rearmed the Croats." Analysts at Jane's Information Group say that Croatian troops were seen wearing American uniforms and carrying U S. communications equipment. (13)

The invasion of Krajina was preceded by a thorough CIA and DIA analysis of the region. (14) According to Balkan specialist Ivo Banac, this "tactical and intelligence support" was furnished to the Croatian Army at the beginning of its offensive. (15)

In November 1994, the United States and Croatia signed a military agreement. Immediately afterward, U.S. intelligence agents set up an operations center on the Adriatic island of Brac, from which reconnaissance aircraft were launched. Two months earlier, the Pentagon contracted Military Professional Resources, Inc (MPRI) to train the Croatian military.(16) According to a Croatian officer, MPRI advisors "lecture us on tactics and big war operations on the level of brigades, which is why we needed them for Operation Storm when we took the Krajina." Croatian sources claim that U.S. satellite intelligence was furnished to the Croatian military. (17) Following the invasion of Krajina, the U.S. rewarded Croatia with an agreement "broadening existing cooperation" between MPRI and the Croatian military. (18) U.S. advisors assisted in the reorganization of the Croatian Army. Referring to this reorganization in an interview with the newspaper Vecernji List, Croatian General Tihomir Blaskic said, "We are building the foundations of our organization on the traditions of the Croatian home guard" - pro-Nazi troops in World War II. (19)

It is worth examining the nature of what one UN official terms "America's newest ally." During World War II, Croatia was a Nazi puppet state in which the Croatian fascist Ustashe murdered as many as one million Serbs, Jews, and Roman (Gypsies). Disturbing signs emerged with the election of Franjo Tudjman to the Croatian presidency in 1990 Tudjman said, "I am glad my wife is neither Serb nor Jew," and wrote that accounts of the Holocaust were "exaggerated" and "one-sided." (20)

Much of Tudjman's financial backing was provided by Ustashe émigrés and several Ustashe war criminals were invited to attend the first convention of Tudjman's political party, the Croatian Democratic Union. (21)

Tudjman presented a medal to a former Ustashe commander living in Argentina, Ivo Rojnica. After Rojnica was quoted as saying, "Everything I did in 1941 I would do again," international pressure prevented Tudjman from appointing him to the post of ambassador to Argentina. When former Ustashe official Vinko Nikolic returned to Croatia, Tudjman appointed him to a seat in parliament. Upon former Ustashe officer Mate Sarlija's return to Croatia, he was personally welcomed at the airport by Defense Minister Gojko Susak, and subsequently given the post of general in the Croatian Army. (22) On November 4, 1996, thirteen former Ustashe officers were presented with medals and ranks in the Croatian Army. (23)

Croatia adopted a new currency in 1994, the kuna, the same name as that used by the Ustashe state, and the new Croatian flag is a near-duplicate of the Ustashe flag. Streets and buildings have been renamed for Ustashe official Mile Budak, who signed the regime's anti-Semitic laws, and more than three thousand anti-fascist monuments have been demolished. In an open letter, the Croatian Jewish community protested the rehabilitation of the Ustashe state. In April 1994, the Croatian government demanded the removal of all "non-white" UN troops from its territory, claiming that "only first-world troops" understood Croatia's "problems." (24)

On Croatian television in April 1996, Tudjman called for the return of the remains of Ante Pavelic, the leader of the Croatian pro-Nazi puppet state "After all, both reconciliation and recognition should be granted to those who deserve it," Tudjman said, adding, "We should recognize that Pavelic's ideas about the Croatian state were positive," but that Pavelic's only mistake was the murder of a few of his colleagues and nationalist allies. (25) Three months later, Tudjman said of the Serbs driven from Croatia "The fact that 90 percent of them left is their own problem... Naturally we are not going to allow them all to return." During the same speech, Tudjman referred to the pro-Nazi state as "a positive thing." (26)

During its violent secession from Yugoslavia in 1991, Croatia expelled more than three hundred thousand Serbs, and Serbs were eliminated from ten towns and 183 villages. (27) In 1993, Helsinki Watch reported: "Since 1991 the Croatian authorities have blown up or razed ten thousand houses mostly of Serbs, but also houses of Croats. In some cases, they dynamited homes with the families inside." Thousands of Serbs have been evicted from their homes. Croatian human-rights activist Ivan Zvonimir Cicak says beatings, plundering, and arrests were the usual eviction methods. (28)

Tomislav Mercep, until recently the advisor to the Interior minister and a member of Parliament, is a death-squad leader. Mercep's death squad murdered 2,500 Serbs in western Slavonia in 1991 and 1992, actions Mercep defends as "heroic deeds." (29) Death squad officer Miro Bajramovic's spectacular confession revealed details: "Nights were worst for [our prisoners]... burning prisoners with a flame, pouring vinegar over their wounds mostly on genitalia and on the eyes. Then there is that little induction field phone, you plug a Serb onto that... The most painful is to stick little pins under the nails and to connect to the three phase current; nothing remains of a man but ashes... After all, we knew they would all be killed, so it did not matter if we hurt him more today or tomorrow."

"Mercep knew everything," Bajramovic claimed. "He told us several times: 'Tonight you have to clean all these shits.' By this he meant all the prisoners should be executed." (30)

Sadly, the Clinton administration's embrace of Croatia follows a history of support for fascists when it suits American geopolitical interests: Chile's Augusto Pinochet, Indonesia's Suharto, Paraguay's Aifredo Stroessner, and a host of others. The consequences of this policy for the people affected have been devastating.

***

Footnotes for this article are lower down...

Further reading...

* Were the U.S. and German governments behind the breakup of Yugoslavia in general and the secession of Croatia in particular? See E. H. Carr's "German and U.S. Involvement in the Balkans,' at http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/carr/carr.html
(Note that even Mr. Carr, who has done a great service by researching and writing this study, pays homage to the US/German alliance he is attacking by affirming, without his otherwise strong evidence, their line that Mr. Milosevic is similar to Mr. Izetbegovic, the Islamic fundamentalist leader in Bosnia, and the late Mr. Tudjman, the fascist leader of Croatia. But, ignoring the section on Milosevic, the text has much merit. - J.I.)

* How did Western institutions come to target Serbia as the anti-humanitarian bad boy of the 90's? See 'Yugoslavia: Through a Dark Glass,' by Diana Johnstone at http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/Johnstone/1Yugo.htm
(This may be the best general introduction to what happened to Yugoslavia in the 1990s.)

* Indications of the resurgence of Nazi thinking in Croatia under the rule of Pres. Tudjman are discussed in 'Nazi Nostalgia in Croatia,' by Diana Johnstone. Go to http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/Johnstone/nostalgi.html

* Alice Mahon, British MP, reports on harsh discrimination today in Croatia in 'Report on Serbs who have Returned to Croatia,' at http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/mahon/croatia.htm

* Sean Gervasi discusses the strategy behind what he argues has been a NATO campaign to shatter Yugoslavia in 'Why Is NATO in Yugoslavia?' at http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/gervasi/why.htm

* Jared Israel deals with NATO strategy in "NATO Buildup in the Balkans: Part of a Deadly Game," http://emperors-clothes.com/news/farish.htm
[This article was written in September 2001, much later than the others mentioned above.]

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Footnotes

1) "Weekly: U.S. Gave Zagreb 'Green Light,' " Tanjug (Belgrade), 26 July 1995. "In Croatia, U.S. Took Calculated Risk," Stephen Engelberg, New York Times News Service, 12 August 1995. "Cleansing the West's Dirty War," Joan Phillips, Living Marxism (London), September 1995. "Who Has Given the Go-Ahead?," interview with Stipe Mesic, Panorama (Milan), 8 August 1995. "The United States Gave Us the Green Light," interview with Mate Mestrovic, by Chantal de Rudder, Le Nouvel Observateur (Paris), 10 August 1995.

(2) "International Inaction in Croatia Will Complicate Bosnian War," George Jahn, Associated Press, 7 August 1995. "NATO Destroyed Krajina Missile Systems," Bosnian Serb News Agency (SRNA) (Belgrade), 6 August 1995. "Abandoned People Must Flee," interview with Slobodan Jarcevic by Cvijeta Arsenic, Oslobodjenje (Sarajevo—Bosnian Serb), 23 August 1995."Cleansing the West's Dirty War," Joan Phillips, op. cit.

(3) "Huge Refugee Exodus Runs Into Shelling, Shooting, Air Attacks," George Jahn, Associated Press, 8 August 1995. "Croat Planes Shell Refugees," Tanjug, 8 August 1995. "SRNA Review of Daily News," SRNA, 8 August 1995. "Cleansing the West's Dirty War," Joan Phillips, op. cit. "Refugees Trapped by Croat Shelling," Robert Fox and Tim Judah, Electronic Telegraph (London) (Online), 8 August 1995. "Croat Mob Attacks Nuns in Fleeing Convoy," Patrick Bishop, Electronic Telegraph, 11 August 1995. "Over 1,000 Serbs Missing in Krajina," Tanjug, 28 January 1997. "Croat Grip Is Tightened as 100,000 Flee," Tim Butcher, Electronic Telegraph, 7 August 1995.

(4) "UN Says Croatians Loot, Use Peacekeepers as Shields," Associated Press, 6 August 1995. "Helsinki Committee Reports on Krajina Operations," Hartmut Fiedler, Oesterreich Eins Radio Network, 21 August 1995. "EU Observers Accuse Croatia of Breaches of Law," Tanjug, 27 October 1995. "UN: Croatians Systematically Burned Serb Homes," Tanjug, 14 August 1995. "Croats Slaughter Elderly by the Dozen," Robert Fisk, The Independent (London), 10 September 1995. "Croats Plunder Their Way through Krajina," Mon Vanderostyne, De Standard (Groot Bijgaarden, The Netherlands), 9 August 1995. "UN Says Croats Loot Serb Villages in Krajina," Agence France-Presse, 17 August 1995. "EU Report Accuses Croatia of Atrocities Against Rebel Serbs," Julian Borger, The Guardian (Manchester), 30 September 1995. "Krajina 'Torched State,' " SRNA, 21 August 1995. "What Was Once Home to 300 Families Is Now a Graveyard," Sarah Helm, The Independent, 24 August 1995. "Helsinki Committee Chronicles Human Rights Abuses," Tanjug, 28 August 1995. "Memorandum on the Ethnic Cleansing of and Genocide Against the Serb People of Croatia and Krajina," Yugoslav Survey, third quarter, 1995.

(5) "Krajina Bears Signs of Croat Ethnic Cleansing," Randolph Ryan, Boston Globe, 8 October 1995. "UN Official Confirms Croatian Crimes in Krajina," Tanjug, 13 October 1995.

(6)"Krajina Bears Signs of Croat Ethnic Cleansing," Randolph Ryan, op.cit

(7) "Croats Burn and Kill with a Vengeance," Robert Fisk, The
Independent, 4 September 1995. "Croats Leave Bloody Trail of Serbian Dead," Tracy Wilkinson, Los Angeles Times, 9n October 1995. "Reports Say Croatia Uses Killing, Arson," John Pomfret,
Washington Post, 30 September 1995. "UN Asks for Inquiry into Krajina Killings," Reuters, 18 August 1995. "EU Observers Accuse Croatia of Breaches of Law," op. cit. "UN Finds Evidence of Mass Killings in Croatia," Reuters, 2 October 1995. "Croats Slaughter Elderly by the Dozen," Robert Fisk, op. cit. "EU Report Accuses Croatia of Atrocities Against Rebel Serbs," Julian Borger, op.cit. "UN: Executions, Possible Mass Graves in Krajina," Agence
France-Presse, 18 August 1995. "Helsinki Committee Chronicles Human Rights Abuses," op cit. "Evidence Emerging of Crimes Against Krajina Serbs," Tanjug, 30 August 1995. "Croats Accused of Atrocities," Associated Press, 29 September 1995.

(8) "Croats Burn and Kill With a Vengeance," Robert Fisk, op.cit."EU Report Accuses Croatia of Atrocities Against Rebel Serbs, " Julian Borger, op. cit. report broadcast, RTBF-1 Television Network (Brussels), 20 August 1995. "Memorandum on the Ethnic Cleansing of and Genocide Against the Serb People of Croatia and Krajina," Yugoslav Survey, third quarter, 1995.

(9) "Krajina Operation: Helsinki Committee Member Describes Atrocities in Krajina," BBC Summary of World Broadcasts, 25 August 1995.

10) "UN Asks for Inquiry into Krajina Killings," op.cit. "UN Finds Evidence of Mass Killings in Croatia," op. cit. "UN: Executions, Possible Mass Graves in Krajina," op. cit.

(11) "Croats Slaughter Elderly by the Dozen," Robert Fisk, op. cit.(12) "Croats Ready for a Fresh Offense Against Serbs," Patrick Bishop, Electronic Telegraph, 16 August 1995. addresses by Franjo Tudjman, Radio Croatia Network, 26 August 1995. "U.S. Says Croatia is Not Guilty of Ethnic Cleansing," Patrick Moore, Open Media Research Institute, 10 August 1995.

(13) "Croatian Minister Says U.S. Gave Advice on Offensive," Jasmina Kuzmanovic, Associated Press, 5 August 1995. "Croatia Takes Effective Control of What's Left of Bosnia," San Francisco Chronicle, 11 August 1995.

(14) "NATO in Dubrovnik," Vladimir Jovanovic, Monitor (Podgorica, Yugoslavia), 23 June 1995.

(15) "AP Report on U.S. Peace Strategy," Associated Press, 13 November 1995.

(16) "AP Report on U.S. Peace Strategy," Associated Press, op cit." U.S. Troops Operate in Croatia," Associated Press, 3 February
1995.

(17) "Invisible U.S. Army Defeats Serbs," Charlotte Eagar, The
Observer (London), 5November 1995.

(18) "Military Cooperation Agreement Signed with U.S." HTV Television (Zagreb) 13 October 1995.

(19) "We Can Prevent Any Serbian Maneuver," interview with Tihomir Blaskic, by Jozo Pavkovic, Vecernji List (Zagreb), 11 March 1995.

20) "Croatian Leader's Invitation to Holocaust Museum Sparks Anger and Shock," Diana Jean Schemo, New York Times News Service, 21 April 1993.

(21) "Croatia, at a Key Strategic Crossroad, Builds Militarily and Geographically," Defense and Foreign Affairs Strategic Policy (London), 31 January 1993. "Who is Franjo Tudjman?" Narodna Armija (Belgrade), 1 March 1990.

(22) "Criticism of Tudjman Award to Ustashe," Foreign Broadcast Information Service Media Note (Media Summary), 27 January 1995. "Nationalism Turns Sour in Croatia," New York Times News Service, 13 November 1993. "Plan to Honour Ustashe Killers Outrages Minorities in Croatia," Ian Traynor, The Guardian, 18 October 1993. "Trpimir for an Executioner and a Victim," Mirko Mirkovic, Feral Tribune (Split, Croatia), 20 February 1995. "Croatian General Former Ustashe," Tanjug, 26 February 1995.

(23) "Croatia Grants Awards to Nazi-Era War Veterans," Reuters, 7 November 1996.

(24) "New Croatian Money Anathema to Serbs," John Pomfret, Washington Post, 31 May 1994. "Plan to Honour Ustashe Killers Outrages Minorities in Croatia," Ian Traynor, op.cit. "Pro-Nazi Legacy Lingers for Croatia," Stephen Kinzer, New York Times News Service, 30 October 1993. "Monument to Anti-Fascism Desecrated in Croatia," Tanjug, February 1995. "Another Anti-Fascist Monument Blown Up in Croatia," Tanjug, 11 April 1995. "Croatia, Symbols of Crimes," Miodrag Dundjerovic, Tanjug, 1 June 1994. "Croatia Adopts New Currency Recalling Fascist Era," Reuters, 9 May 1994. "Hiding Genocide," Gregory Copley, Defense and Foreign Affairs Strategic Policy, 31 December 1992. "Croatia is Rehabilitating Ustashism and the Independent State of Croatia," Politika (Belgrade), 12 February 1993. "Tudjman Calls for All-White Peace Force in Croatia," Eve Ann Prentice, The Times (London), 11 April 1995. "Croatia to Seek Expulsion of Non-White U.N. Troops," Tanjug, 10 April 1995.

(25) Interview with Franjo Tudjman, HTV Television (Zagreb), 22 April 1996.

(26) Address by Franjo Tudjman to the Croatian World Congress in Brioni, Radio Croatia Network (Zagreb), 6 July 1996.

(27) "Croatian Towns, Villages Cleansed of Serbs," Tanjug, 26 January 1993. "Savovic: Croatia Expelled 300,000 Serb," Tanjug, 5 November1993 "Serb Party Official: 350,000 Serbs Driven Out." Tanjug, 26 August 1994.

(28) "Croatian Police Tactics Cited," Associated Press, 3 October 1994. "Helsinki Committee Chair: Collective Vendetta Against Croatia's Serbs," Tanjug, 7 may 1994. "Protests Prevent Latest Wave of Croatian Apartment Evictions," Radio Free Europe, 12 July 1994. "Croatian Human Rights Activist: Zagreb Backs Human Rights Violations," Tanjug, 28 September 1994. "Rights Groups Report Abuses by Croatia," David Binder, New York Times News Service, 7 December 1993.

29) "Interior Minister Aide Accused of War Crimes," ZDF Television Network (Mainz), 17 May 1994. "Slovene Daily Says Croatian Leaders Keep Quiet About Massacre of Serbs," Tanjug, 14 January 1994. "Croatian Paper Calls Mass Killings of Serbs a National Disgrace," Tanjug, 12 July 1994. "Zagreb Knows About Mass Killings of Serbs," Tanjug, 23 July 1994. "Dossier: Pakracka Poljana," Feral Tribune (Split, Croatia), 1 September 1997. "Death Camps and Mass Graves in Western Slavonia: Marino Selo and Pakracka Poljana," dossier prepared by Serbian Council, Belgrade, 1993.

(30) "Miro Bajramovic's Confession," Feral Tribune (Split, Croatia), 1 September 1997. "Croatian's Confession Describes Torture and Killing on Vast Scale," Chris Hedges, New York Times, 5 September 1997.

http://www.tenc.net/



At 50, Cuba's revolution showing its age



From Morgan Neill
CNN Havana Bureau Chief

HAVANA, Cuba (CNN) -- Thursday marks the 50th anniversary of the Cuban revolution, when Fidel Castro and a group of guerrillas toppled a longstanding U.S.-backed dictator.

A Cuban youth passes a Havana storefront poster touting the 50th anniversary of Fidel Castro's Cuban revolution.

But January 1, 1959, was a long time ago. In Cuba today, when people refer to "the revolution," they often mean the country's aging, established government.

After so many years, people's hopes for the revolution's future are hardly revolutionary.

"I hope that it continues to move forward, because this country needs development. We're really behind," said a student who did not give his name.
"More opportunities in the economy and in transportation," another man said.

But there was a time when the goals were much loftier.

In the first days of 1959, when Castro and his bearded rebels rolled into Havana on tanks and other captured vehicles, they talked of sweeping changes -- an end to corruption, justice for the poor and independence from foreign domination. Watch what some Cubans think of the 50-year revolution »

A half-century later, their achievements are a mixed bag.

Preach any other gospel,..let him be accursed


Galatians 1


1Paul, an apostle, (not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead;)

2And all the brethren which are with me, unto the churches of Galatia:

3Grace be to you and peace from God the Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ,

4Who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father:

5To whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

6I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel:

7Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.

8But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.

9As we said before, so say I now again, if any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed.

10For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ.

11But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man.

12For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ.

13For ye have heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews' religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it:

14And profited in the Jews' religion above many my equals in mine own nation, being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions of my fathers.

15But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace,

16To reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the heathen; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood:

17Neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which were apostles before me; but I went into Arabia, and returned again unto Damascus.

18Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and abode with him fifteen days.

19But other of the apostles saw I none, save James the Lord's brother.

20Now the things which I write unto you, behold, before God, I lie not.

21Afterwards I came into the regions of Syria and Cilicia;

22And was unknown by face unto the churches of Judaea which were in Christ:

23But they had heard only, That he which persecuted us in times past now preacheth the faith which once he destroyed.

24And they glorified God in me.

Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Clintons, Revelers Ring in 2009 in Times Square


Clintons, thousands of revelers celebrate end of troubled 2008, ring in '09 in Times Square


By COLLEEN LONG Associated Press Writer

NEW YORK January 1, 2009 (AP)


The Associated Press


Hundreds of thousands of revelers rang in 2009 from frigid Times Square as the famous Waterford crystal ball dropped, signaling the end of a historic and troubled year that saw the election of the first black U.S. president and the worst economic crisis in decades.

As the clock struck midnight, a ton of confetti rained down while the partygoers hugged and kissed.

Josh Torres and his girlfriend, Sarah Manganello, both 21, screamed and cheered as they watched the ball drop. Manganello had advice for people in the new year: "Learn from what you've done and move forward."

The wind chill made it feel like 1 degree in the area, but that didn't stop the throngs bundled in fur hats, heavy coats and sleeping bags from attending the event.

Former President Bill Clinton and Sen. Hillary Clinton helped Mayor Michael Bloomberg lower the ball atop 1 Times Square for the 60-second countdown to midnight. Last year, Hillary Clinton was in Iowa campaigning for the presidency, and now she's expecting to be secretary of state in President-elect Barack Obama's administration.

Many other New Year's Eve traditions around the country were in place, but some festivities fell victim to hard times, and those that remained felt somewhat subdued. The nation's economic troubles made many people less interested in giving 2008 an expensive send-off. Public celebrations were canceled in communities from Louisville, Ky., to Reno, Nev., and promoters in Miami Beach, Fla., reported slower ticket sales than expected for celebrity-studded parties that they say would have sold out in past years.


But New York's celebration was still going strong. Five minutes before midnight, 1,000 balloons with the words "Joy," "Hope" and "2009" were released from rooftops in the area. The Waterford crystal ball — 12 feet in diameter and weighing nearly 12,000 pounds — dropped as the crowd erupted in cheers.

Sam Tenorio and his family drove to New York from Orlando, Fla., so his teenage daughter Brianna could see the Jonas Brothers perform live in Times Square.


Milk Toast Christianity


Milk Toast Christianity

It's the order of the day!

The days of preaching the Eternal Gospel* are over; The stage has been cleared for the Social Gospel to replace the Final Warning. Christianity Light is the mood of the day; Like in Miller-Lite, and it's no coincidence that what is being preached from 'most pulpits' is from the pits of hell, it's the wine of Babylon. That lightness produces a stupor that impairs its hearers from distinguishing truth from error, and virtually prepares them to be duped into the fold of the enemy of souls. Actually, it's the enemy's creation; Who else could have invented a gospel that is less filling (no substance) and low on calories (no lasting spiritual nourishment).

milk-toast 
Pronunciation [milk-tohst]

adjective
1.
easily dominated; extremely mild; ineffectual; namby-pamby; wishy-washy.–noun
2
.
milquetoast.


Origin: 1815–25


Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006


Milk Toast Christianity is what I've called this strange phenomenon. It seems as if all the Protestant, Evangelical, Pentecostal, and Catholic Churches are using the same format; As if the Ecumenical goals that were set during the Roman Catholic Church's Vatican II Council, had been achieved: All have followed in the steps of the holy see. None call her the whore of Babylon any longer, or maintain a clear definition of prophecy. The lackadaisical, and the nonchalant has replaced the Protestant convictions of Sola Scriptura, and have opted for the RC doctrines, and traditions. For example they regularly find a new Bible version that seems better than the last one they sanctioned. They are adrift in a sea of confusion without a sail, without a paddle bound for perdition. Oh, that they would come to their senses and return to deliver the Final Warning, to give the trumpet that certain sound?


For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle? . 1 Corinthians 14:8.


Milk Toast Christians love to quote John 3:16:


For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.


It provides them a warm-fuzzy feeling. All they have to do is just "believe"; Well, if they read the rest of the Lord's words they would discover that the Lord requires obedience also. Let's read verses 17 through 21, and see if it is so:


17For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.
18He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
19And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
20For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.
21But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.

Brethren, Milk Toast Christians are not what the Lord is coming to redeem someday soon. It will be obedient servants similar to their Master, not foolish virgins, or unfaithful stewards. He will spew those out of His mouth, and say: I never knew thee!

21Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
22Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
23And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.
24Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock:
25And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock.
26And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand:
27And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it.
Matthew 7:21-27.

Those that insist on having Milk Toast Christianity; I suggest you prayerfully read Matthew 25. Return to the sound doctrines, feed the sheep.


Arsenio.


Maranatha.

*The Everlating Gospel

Urban Danger (MMM)


Just a quick update...Thank you for your prayers for our trip this fall/winter. It was a tremendous blessing to be able to share with so many at each of the 15 locations visited. There was so much interest that we could not fit all the locations into this trip, so we have decided to start working on another trip early this spring and visit locations all the way from California, across the south, to the east coast. Please let us know ASAP if you are/will be working on hosting an event at your church/group during that time period.
We also wanted to send this note to let you know that we have been working away on the Urban Danger project and hope to have it completed by the end of February. We had previously posted a 13 minute preview several months ago which was simply a collage of snippets from interviews that had been completed up to that point. The new 18 minute preview should be very similar to how the first 18 minutes of the DVD turns out.
To view the new 18 minute preview, simply click on the link below:
You can also visit our website, http://mountainmediaministries.org/ , to see an update on the latest projects we are working on.
Wishing you and yours a very blessed new year. It gives promise of being an extremely eventful one.
The MeissnersMountain Media Ministries
372 Habersham Hills Cir. #211Cornelia, Ga. 30531