RWC Unfiltered 8-25-11

Turkey is challenging U.S. policy in the Mediterranean Sea. The Washington based Institute for Near East Policy said that the government of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan was endangering U.S. interests in the eastern Mediterranean. The report, authored by analyst Simon Henderson, said Washington has been encouraging such regional states as Israel and the Republic of Cyprus to explore and develop crude oil and natural gas resources in the sea.

"Ankara cannot be permitted to enjoy the benefits of a strong relationship with Washington while undermining U.S. objectives in the eastern Mediterranean," the report, titled "Turkey's Threat to Israel's New Gas Riches," said.

A U.S. company, Noble Energy, has been the prime contractor of Israeli and Cypriot gas exploration projects in the eastern Mediterranean. But Ankara has threatened both countries, saying it does not recognize their sovereignty over the exploration areas. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea allows each country the right to exploit resources up to 200 nautical miles from its coast.

"Ankara's anger with Cyprus will likely grow after July 2012, when the island holds the EU presidency for six months," the report said.

Erdogan fancies himself as capable and appears to aspire to resurrect a 21^st century Ottoman Empire centered around an Islamic Turkey.

The Ottoman Empire contained 29 provinces and numerous vassal states, some of which were later absorbed into the empire, while others were granted various types of autonomy during the course of centuries. ^[With Constantinople (present-day Istanbul, Ottoman Turkish:, Istanbul^[ and , Kostantiniyye) as its capital city,

The empire was at the center of interactions between the Eastern and Western worlds for six centuries.

Turkey and what remained of the Ottoman Emprie sided with Germany in World War I and after the defeat the Ottoman Empire came to an end, as a regime under a monarchy, on 1 November 1922. It formally ended, as a de jure state, on 24 July 1923, under the Treaty of Lausanne. The Republic of Turkey, which was officially proclaimed on 29 October 1923, became one of the successor states of the Ottoman Empire^[ as part of the treaty. Simultaneosuly Iraq was formed as a new Monarchy which was the precursor of Modern Iraq and we know much of that history.

Bob Dylan's real name is Robert Zimmerman.

Mort Zuckerman, Editor-in-Chief of U. S. News and World Report says U. S. unemployment “when properly measured” is over 19%. This is equivilant to a 1930’s era Depression but then when people were lined up at soup kitchens you could see them but now when tens of millions get unemployment checks they are invisible..

In `1979 the 75-ton SKYLAB crashed into Australia. No one was hurt but NASA was fined $400 by Australia for littering. Saturday a 13,000 satellite broke up as it passed over Africa and the Indian Ocean and scattered pieces across the north Pacifi. Newer models have a maneuvering engine and fuel supply to enable ground controllers to control and guide them.

A local court has ruled the Santa Barbara and National Boy Scout Councils face a potential for multi million damages suit because of a then 28-year olf adult leader who allegedly molested a then 13-year-old youth member at a Christmas Tree sale lot and a local executive is accused of trying to cover it up. At its core are allegation of a secret file and a policy of secrecy by the boy Scouts of America that dates from the 1920s. Reportedly the adult man involved had a record of questionable behavior but that’s unconfirmed.

Friday Solyndra’s top executives took the 5^th Amendment 20 times today in hearings before Congress.

Dick Morris says he thinks Obama might “pull a Lyndon Johnson” and not run for re-election.

Morris’ theory goes like this: the economy is in shambles because of (in Obama’s mind) “partisanship” and Obama must spend all his efforts to get the United States back on economic track.  As evidenced by Michelle Obama’s dour expressions at the recent joint session of Congress.

Obama can no longer claim to be the candidate of “hope,” especially to the 50% of unemployed high school graduate age young black men in every urban setting across America, he still has a strong voter base.  They just might not have cars, insurance or gas money to all get to the polls for him next year. But, Morris forgets tht the Democrat party will bus them to the polls. So, that’s silly.

Obama won’t pull an LBJ.  Obama is a supremely political person despite the First Lady’s public pouting. Hubris and his astonishing narcissism forbids it.

So, unless Obama’s favorable ratings continue their decline in big statewide blue states like California to levels below the popularity of former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, I think he is in it for the long haul, one-term President or not.

A bizarre set of circumstances sent an eastern Pennsylvania man to the hospital with a self-inflicted stab wound to the chest. Freemansburg police say 50-year-old The man was opening a bag of coffee with a knife on Thursday night when his wife asked him a question. As he turned to her, Forte said a cat ran under his feet and he fell with the knife in his hand.

The steak knife went about an inch into his chest. He was treated at a hospital and police say he will be fine.

Freemansburg police Sgt. Martin Comer said he was skeptical at first but a preliminary investigation supports Forte's story. The man's wife and son corroborated the account. Comer said he will investigate further but the stabbing does not appear suspicious.The cat wasn’t hurt – yet.

Scientists are rewriting the history of human migration based on a 100-year-old hair sample.

Genetic analysis by Danish researchers of curly, dark- colored locks indicates that Australian Aborigines are direct descendants of the first people to migrate out of Africa, according to findings published in the journal Science. The Aborigines' forebears probably made their way across the world 24,000 years before another wave led Europe's and Asia's settlement, the scientists said.

The analysis of the hair, donated by an Aborigine man to a British anthropologist a century ago, shows that Aborigines' ancestors split from the first populations in Africa 62,000 to 75,000 years ago, moving east and eventually to Australia. Europe and Asia were first settled as many as 38,000 years ago, the researchers said.

"Our findings support the hypothesis that present-day Aboriginal Australians descend from the earliest humans to occupy Australia, likely representing one of the oldest continuous populations outside Africa," the researchers wrote in the study.

The findings contradict the view of a single exodus from Africa that populated the rest of the world yet fits better with archeological findings that show human inhabitation of Australia as long as 50,000 years ago, according to the study's authors.

State-run Chinese media reported last week that over 80 percent of the Chinese people oppose U.S. arms sales to Taiwan, in what observers say is likely a propaganda ploy to bolster Beijing's opposition to U.S. arms sales. A poll conducted by a subsidiary of the Communist Party mouthpiece People's Daily, i

In an unprecedented move Obama is covertly signaled its support for the administration of Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou by casting doubt on his main opponent in elections set for January. It is not hard to imagine that Obama has caved in to the Chinese lest a challenging pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party candidate Tsai Ing-wen win upsetting Obama’s Rodney-King-Like go along to get along abandonment of the free Chinese. At the insistence of Mainland China Obama will not sell Taiwan advanced F-16 C/D fighters.

Observers call the US subservience to the Chinese communist “stunningly” disappointing.

Gadhafi spokesman Musa Ibrahim threatened that pro-Gadhafi forces will carry out jihad "for years to come." Ibrahim claimed that Gadhafi is in "excellent" health with "high morale," according to a report in the Arabic television Al-Ray.

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U.S. efforts to wage ideological warfare against Islamist extremism is failing.

A senior Pentagon official, Jake Schaffner, said during a security conference, that the Pentagon is not doing enough to train its leaders to wage ideological war.

Schaffner said the Pentagon has been unable to effectively integrate information operations into its military operations. "We've been fighting that fight for quite awhile now," he said of the efforts to use more ideological warfare than kinetic warfare.

"My personal opinion is that so far my department has gotten the lanes thoroughly and completely f'd up when preparing to actually engage military operations and information operations," Schaffner said.

Schaffner said a professional cadre of information warfare officers is needed who understand information warfare and how it is used. He said the function should not simply be added on to combat arms but must more closely be integrated with how the military fights.

"When the combatant commander goes out there now, I think the actual dominant environment in which they are operating is an information environment," Schaffner said.

Schaffner said better training of military leaders is needed to stress the use of information as a key strategic weapons.

111,111,111 x 111,111,111 = 12,345,678,987,654,321

Obama s pressing ahead with efforts to reach an agreement with Russia on U.S. missile defenses that critics say could lead to legal restrictions on U.S. defenses in Europe.

Ellen Tauscher, the uber-liberal under secretary of state for arms control and international security affairs who is said by Pentagon officials to oppose robust U.S. missile defenses, last week met in Moscow with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabakov in London.

The meeting was part of the arms control and international security working group of the Russian-American Presidential Commission.

Tauscher was embarrassed last May when she had promised her Russian counterparts that President Obama would sign an understanding on missile defense at a summit in Deauville, France with Russian President Dmitri Medvedev. But the agreement was pulled from signing at the last minute amid concerns that it contained legally binding restrictions on U.S. missile defenses, something the Pentagon opposed.

Russia has been demanding a legally-binding accord that U.S. officials say is part of a strategy of constraining U.S. missile defenses that Moscow fears could be used to counter Russian strategic missiles.

On Sept. 15, Russian Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov met with German Defense Minister Thomas de Maiziere and voiced new worries about U.S. missile defenses. It was also disclosed by the German defense minister that a missile defense agreement is expected next year.

"We shared our concerns relating to the deployment of NATO's missile defense system in Europe," Serdyukov said following his meeting with de Maiziere.

Maiziere said in response that "we do not share Russia's concern but we understand it."

On the new accord, he added: "We expect that Russia and the US will reach understanding on this issue before the NATO summit in Chicago (May 2012)."

Meanwhile, Iran's missile program is continuing to make gains. Iranian state-run media announced last week that Teheran successfully tested an anti-radar missile during exercises in the northwestern part of the country. The air-launched missile was fired from an Su-24 fighter against radar ground targets.

Obama recently opened a backdoor channel to Tehran, trusting that Iran would be more approachable for cooperation on knotty Middle East issues after missing its footing in the Arab uprisings. Iran's controversial nuclear program was not broached.

This secret initiative to light last weekend along with its rejection by Iran's hardline Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The UN International Atomic Energy Agency has stressed its increasing concern "about the possible existence in Iran of past or current undisclosed nuclear-related activities involving military-related organizations, including activities related to the development of a nuclear payload for a missile, about which the Agency continues to receive new information."

1. The nuclear watchdog was also alarmed by three disclosures made by Fereydoon Abbas, head of Iran's atomic energy agency, Monday, Aug. 29, attesting to the speeding-up of its military nuclear program and preparations for a possible attack on its installations.
Abbasi boasted that Iran's nuclear fuel production already far exceeded its needs. Military sources report that this first public announcement meant that Tehran was about to move on from 20 percent enriched uranium to 60 percent – the last step before the 90 percent enrichment for weapons-grade fuel.

2. According to several sources, Iran has already stocked 4,500 kilograms of low-enriched uranium, which would be enough for four nuclear weapons after further enrichment.

3. Abbas pronounced "dead" the 2009 proposal for the West to supply Iran with new fuel for its small research reactor in return for an end to Iranian production of the fuel. “We will no longer negotiate a fuel swap and a halt to our production of fuel,” he said.

4. The head of Iran's atomic agency also revealed the imminent transfer of its critical enrichment facilities from Natanz to a heavily fortified subterranean facility near the holy city of Qom to keep it safe from air, missile and cyber attack.

Tehran has made it clear that the facility will not be open to international oversight and will use the most advanced centrifuges – IR-4 and IR-2m - for speeding up the production of highly-enriched uranium.

Western intelligence sources estimated Sunday, Sept. 4, that Iran's advances had brought forward to the spring of 2012 the potential completion of between two and four bombs and the ability to conduct  a nuclear test.

At the White House, Tommy Vietor, a spokesman for the National Security Council said that the Iranian plan “to install and operate centrifuges at Qom is a violation of their United Nations security obligations and another provocative act.”

While demonstrating the arrogance of a would-be global nuclear power, Iran suffered an unexpected diplomatic snub Sunday, Sept. 4, when parliamentary speaker Ali Larijani was informed at the last minute that he would not get to meet the Chinese and North Korean heads of state when he visited Beijing and Pyongyang – only low-ranking officials. He thereupon cancelled his trips.

China and North Korea appear to have decided to keep their distance from the nuclear miscreant in Tehran.

On Aug. 31, French President Nicolas Sarkozy warned, "Iran's attempts to build long-range missiles and nuclear weapons could lead unnamed countries to launch a pre-emptive attack."

· Qaddafi and sons have New Fierce 12,000- man Army

· “Fat Chance” Christie Will Run

· Texas Ends Last Meal For Condemned

· E=MC2: Well Not Exactly

· Turkey and Ottoman Empire Ambitions

· Zuckerman Says Real Unemployment 19%

· Santa Barbara Scouts Face Molestation Lawsuit

· Obama Could Do LBJ: Morris

· New Discoveries About Human Migration

· Obama Caves-in To China Snubs Taiwan

· Aborigines Descendants of Africans

· U. S Ideo(t) War F’d Up: Pentagon

· Bend Over Former Euro Allies

· Iran On Nuclear Threshold

Delores Hope died last week. She was 102 years old. She married funny man Bob Hope in 1934 and celebrated 69 years together when he died in 2003. The couple donated the 80 acres where the Eisenhower Medical Center stands. It opened in 1971

Muammar Qaddafi and his sons have raised a new army of 12,000 fighters of loyal Tuareg tribes of the Sahara, military sources report. Libyan rebel troops reportedly clashed with his diehards after entering the town of Sirte from the west. Two thousand kilometers to the south, in Niger, the ousted Libyan ruler won a guarantee of protection and alliance from the Touareg tribal council and their declaration of war on his enemies.

Although rebel ranks are seriously divided, they derived encouragement from NATO's decision to extend its naval and air campaign in Libya by another 90 days to help them dislodge Qaddafi's troops from the cities they are still holding.

Saturday, Sept. 24, his daughter Aisha said in an audio recording that her father was in high spirits and fighting alongside his supporters. Last week, our sources report, a Tuareg tribal council convened in Niger extended full protection to Qaddafi, his sons, his military chiefs and the still-loyal members of the ousted regime. Members of the rebel National Transitional Council were proclaimed enemies of the tribes.

Three days earlier, the NTC claimed the capture of the southern desert town of Sabha, even though they only reached its outskirts.

Military sources report that the nomadic Touareg roam freely through the Saharan regions which cover all of eastern Algeria, eastern Mali, western Niger, northern Burkina Faso and southern Libya, fiercely independent of all five governments. They are renowned as crack desert special operations fighters with extraordinary stamina, who can subsist on 100 grams of dried dates and a half liter of water for 24 hours while covering 100 kilometers on foot. They don't need to carry water because of their hereditary knowledge of the Sahara's hidden springs.

By recruiting them, Qaddafi has assured his forces and top officials safety of movement through all five African countries, out of range of NATO air strikes and rebel attacks.
Indeed, the Tuareg tribal council sent warnings to the rulers of Niger, where some of Qaddafi's generals and troops have gone to ground, that if any harm comes to them or if they are arrested, the tribes will turn their guns on the Niamey government and its forces.

Taking advantage of their new freedom, the ousted ruler's son Saadi Qaddafi and his personal security director Gen. Mansour Daw, who arrived in Niger in early September at the head of a 200-truck military convoy, crossed back into Libya this week for an unknown destination. There were earlier reports of their detention in Niger.

On Sept. 7, intelligence sources located Qaddafi, his sons and several thousand fighters, at the Saharan oasis of Targan, a few hundred kilometers southwest of the Libyan oasis city of Jiffra. He is presumed to have moved on to a new hideout since then, closely guarded by his Tuareg allies.

Another Qaddafi son, Khamis, commander of the 32nd Libyan Brigade whom the rebels and Western media reported killed, is said by our sources to be still in action against rebel forces at the head of this 3,000-strong elite unit.

Prevented by NATO air strikes and oversight from large-scale military movements among rebel strongholds, he has split them up into units of 20-30 fighters and scattered them around various battle zones for forays against rebel military and strategic key points. They have begun hit-and-run strikes in the towns of Brega, Ras Lanouf and Zawiya, unreported by NATO or rebel spokesmen.

How and where Qaddafi has squirreled away his treasury is not known. Similar questions are unanswered about munitions.

From the bottom of the polls to the top of the pack, Godfather Pizza guru and businessman Herman Cain won the Republican Party of Florida’s nationally watched presidential straw poll Saturday in a sign that frontrunner Rick Perry is in deep trouble.

Cain’s victory with 37 percent of the vote from 3,000 party loyalists was a major defeat for Perry, the frontrunner in Florida and national polls, who garnered only 15 percent, Romney got less. In the biennial Mackinac (Michigan) Republican Leadership Conference MItt Romney won 51 percent of the 681 votes cast. Texas Gov. Rick Perry, finished second with 17 percent.

Perhaps the biggest man in GOP politics these days is 46 year-old, 5’11”, 300 pound New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie who after a powwow last week with several top Republicans including a couple billionaires is reconsidering his decision not to enter the 2012 presidential race. He says he will let top Republicans know within days about his plans.

Even at 300 pounds Christe would be dwarfed by President William “Big Bill” Howard Taft who tipped the scales at a svelt 344 pounds (September 15, 1857 – March 8, 1930) was the 27th President of the United States (1909–1913) and later the tenth Chief Justice of the United States (1921–1930). He is the only person to have served in both offices.

"Big Bill" graduated from Yale College Phi Beta Kappa in 1874 and from Cincinnati Law School in 1880.

Teddy Roosevelt backed Taft’s election then ran against him after one term on his third party “Bull Moose Party” ticket created after Teddy lost the nomination to Taft resulting in the election of Woodrow Wilson.

It Christie runs it will send scholars into the archives for Taft era fat man jokes which abounded including then Justice Bremer’s quip that Taft is the most polite man in Washington who gave up his seat on a trolley car to three women.

When Taft got stuck in the White House bath tub the 6’2”. 344 pound Taft had to be cut out and a new 7’ X 41” tub constructed. it is at the Smithsonian Museum.

Perry's quick rise in the polls and indications he may be fading — coupled with nagging questions about Romney's ability to lead the party after backing a Massachusetts healthcare law Romneycare ominously similar to President Obama's own Obamacare program — have created a window of opportunity for Christie, and odds makers favor a Christie run, The governor was named the “hottest” politician in the country by a Qunnipiac University poll released last March and will take over the top spot almost immediately if he runs.

If Christie enters that ends what little chance Bachman, Paul and all other backbenchers have -- drying up money and support.

Mitt Romney led Obama by 7 points going into Thursday GOP debate. Perry trailed Obama by 2%. Nobody else comes close to Obama. Romney outpointed Perry and took the trophy Thursday evening.

Since Perry entered the race and started debating, his performance in the head-to-head match-ups has gotten worse. A CBS poll from last week shows that Republicans are split between wanting someone who shares their views and someone who can beat Obama.

New Hampshire looks like a Republican Primary runaway for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney so far, based on the first Rasmussen Reports primary poll in the Granite State this political cycle.

Texas, the nation’s execution champion has ended the last meal “tradition” that granted condemned prisoners tehright to special request for their last meal calling it feel good and foolish. Nationally 96 were executed in 1996- the record; 46 were executed ib 2010.

Thelast meal tradition’s beginning is lost in time far predating Jesus Last Supper.Ancient Greeks, China, and Rome all traditionally gave the condemned man a final meal. The Aztecs fed their human sacrifices for up to a year before killing them—it’s uncleara why.

It is all likely rooted in superstition: a meal was a highly symbolic social act. accepting freely offered food symbolized making peace with the host.

Nazi who organized the Holocaust resulting in the mass muder of millions of Jews and others Adolf Eichmann declined a special meal, prefering a bottle of Carmel, a dry red i\ironically Israeli wine. He drank about half of it Alcohol is denied in the U. S.

Every 45 seconds, a house catches on fire in the United States!

Albert Einstein -- a pillar of physics - said that nothing can go faster than the speed of light – that theory appears to be smashed by an oddball subatomic particle that has apparently made a giant end run around Einstein's theories.

Scientists at the world's largest physics lab said Thursday they have clocked neutrinos traveling faster than light. That's something that according to Einstein's 1905 special theory of relativity—the famous E (equals) mc2 equation—just doesn't happen.

"The feeling that most people have is this can't be right, this can't be real," said James Gillies, a spokesman for the European Organization for Nuclear Research. The organization, known as CERN, hosted part of the experiment, which is unrelated to the massive $10 billion Large Hadron Collider also located at the site.

Gillies told The Associated Press that the readings have so astounded researchers that they are asking others to independently verify the measurements before claiming an actual discovery.

Other outside scientists expressed skepticism at CERN's claim that the neutrinos—one of the strangest well-known particles in physics—were observed smashing past the cosmic speed barrier of 186,282 miles per second (299,792 km per second).

University of Maryland physics department chairman Drew Baden called it "a flying carpet," something that was too fantastic to be believable.

Of course Star Trekkers have known about trans light speed for decades ever since Zephram Cochrane invented his warp drive

The microwave was “invented” after a researcher walked by a radar tube and a chocolate bar melted in his pocket. World War II era sailors notoriously reheated coffee in the same manner to the chargrin of shipboard radar technicians.