Monday, January 30, 2006

Another Angle 30 - January - 2006

ANOTHER ANGLE
News others won't tell you




NATIONAL:



Rice Admits U.S. Underestimated Hamas Strength
Ms. Rice's comments seemed to reflect a certain second-guessing over how the administration had failed to foresee, or factor into its thinking, the possibility of a Hamas victory.



Pentagon Can Now Fund Foreign Militaries
The move, included in a little-noticed provision of the 2006 National Defense Authorization Act passed last month, marks a legislative victory for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who pushed hard for the new powers to deal with emergency situations.


Study Says 80% of New Orleans Blacks May Not Return
If the projections are realized, the New Orleans population will shrink to about 140,000 from its prehurricane level of 484,000, and the city, nearly 70 percent black before the storm, will become majority white.



Grand theft New Orleans
San Francisco Bay View - National Black Newspaper of the Year
People heard about the numerous abuses by the military and Blackwater mercenaries who were called in to “restore order” by setting up a hostile military environment simulating martial law – but who did little to search for or save the residents, most of whom were still in need of rescue, food, water, health care and shelter.



New Black Cable Channel Mixes Old Shows, New Documentaries
TV One, recently added to Time Warner Cable on its digital tier, is the black channel for grown-ups. You wont find reality shows about dorm life on TV One or a hip-hop knockoff of the MTV Music Awards. It doesnt air music videos obsessed with bling and booty. It has a cooking show, a new financial advice show (with Michelle Singletary) and, coming soon, documentaries and new dramas.



INTERNATIONAL:



Iran's new bourse may threaten the dollar
Should the Iranian Oil Bourse gain momentum, it will be eagerly embraced by major economic powers and will precipitate the demise of the dollar. America's greatest export is currently the dollar and when "the balance of reserve holdings starts to shift from dollars to euros, that's very bad news for America's system of dollar hegemony.



EU inquiry may call Cheney
Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, the most hawkish members of the US administration, may be invited to appear before a European parliamentary committee investigating allegations of "extraordinary rendition" of terrorist suspects by the CIA.



Osama bodyguard is quietly let go
Tabarak was captured and taken to the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where he was classified as such a high-value prisoner that the Pentagon repeatedly denied requests by the International Committee of the Red Cross to see him. Then, after spending almost three years at the base, he was suddenly released.


IRAQ:



Don't Call It Napalm
Little is known or seen of the air part of the American war of today, in Iraq. After the U.S. and Britain withdraw the bulk of their ground troops, plans call for the air war to be beefed up and kept that way for years to come.



U.S. invasion responsible deaths of over 250,000 civilians in Iraq
The on-going American Occupation has also created worsened civil strife as well as mass environmental destructions and related public health problems that is associated with American bomb-related released radioactive and other life-threatening pollutions.



BUSH CRIME FAMILY:



Rumsfeld's Roadmap to Propaganda
The 74-page "Information Operations Roadmap" admits that "information intended for foreign audiences, including public diplomacy and PSYOP, increasingly is consumed by our domestic audience and vice-versa," but argues that "the distinction between foreign and domestic audiences becomes more a question of USG [U.S. government] intent rather than information dissemination practices."



Bush once again playing on fears of U.S. public
With apologies to Garrett Morris, fear ''been beddy beddy good'' to the White House. That's why Sept. 11 has become Team Bush's fallback position, its default reply to every hard question.
A ruinous war fought under false pretenses? Sept. 11.
Indefinite detention of alleged terrorists? Sept. 11.
Torture? Sept. 11.
The right of the people to dissent? Sept. 11.
Spying on Americans in violation of federal law? Sept. 11.
A growing record of incompetence and lies? Sept. 11.



Gag Orders
And the secrets and secret deals continue to tumble out.



ECONOMY:



Petrodollar Warfare: Oil, Iraq and the Future of the Dollar
Asian countries hold approximately $2 trillion in dollars and dollar denominated securities. China has already announced its intention to diversity its foreign asset holdings, and India is considering a similar course. The Iranian oil bourse could be the pebble that starts an avalanche.Petrodollar Warfare will help you pick through the rubble.



OP-ED:



Memo to Big Oil Companies: Africa’s Oil Belongs to Africans ...
We must begin to encourage the African World to make honest assessments of the historical relationship between Africa and large foreign corporations generally. Too many Africans are mesmerized by the extent of western economic development, and a fallacious belief that Africa’s full-scale embrace of capitalism will replicate such prosperity on that continent. This myth must be punctured with the fact that western countries were able to prosper only because they exploited Africa.



They Know They Broke the Law
One can imagine George W. Bush silently thanking God each night for the fact that he has a Republican congress at his back. Were it otherwise, the man would be neck-deep in impeachment hearings. This road trip, and the tortured convolutions being put forth as justification for spying on Americans, leads to one inescapable conclusion: they know what they did was illegal.



SCIENCE&TECHNOLOGY:



Russia plans to mine the Moon
"We are planning to build a permanent base on the Moon by 2015 and by 2020 we can begin the industrial-scale delivery ... of the rare isotope Helium-3."



HEALTH&FITNESS:



Natural Food, Unnatural Prices
We started looking around for something to buy. As we stared bug-eyed at the lofty price tags, I wondered aloud what sort of income it would take to become a regular Whole Foods shopper. Why not give Whole Foods the Wal-Mart test?



FOOD&DRINK:



Grilled Pound Cake with Pineapple "Salsa" and Tequila Whipped Cream
The grill was the original toaster. And there's nothing like a quick sizzle on the grill to transform ordinary pound cake into a singular, even extraordinary dessert. Especially when paired with a pineapple "salsa" and tequila-scented whipped cream.



REVIEWS/INTERVIEWS:



Harry Belafonte on Bush, Iraq, Hurricane Katrina and Having His Conversations with Martin Luther...
He sent money to bail King out of the Birmingham City Jail and raised thousands of dollars to release other imprisoned protesters. He financed the Freedom Rides, and supported voter-registration drives and helped to organize the March on Washington in 1963.


HUMOR?:



Candorville