Norway Killer May Only Get 21 Years
Anders Behring Breivik, a Norwegian man who killed 77 people last year with a car bomb and a firearm is facing only a maximum sentence of 21 years in prison. Breivik acknowledged that he committed these acts but claims that he was at war and acted out of self defense. Breivik showed no emotion or remorse and may be deemed criminally insane. If he is determined to be insane, he will be put in psychiatric care. However, if he is deemed mentally competent, he will face criminal charges. A special courtroom has been constructed for the trial so that it can accommodate more than 200 people.
Ron Paul Backs Israel's Decision
Republican Candidate Ron Paul was quoted by Business Insider that he supports Israel's decision to relocate U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and would sign an executive order to move it if he were elected president. The real issue here is not what America wants, but what does Israel want. If Israel wants their capital to be Jerusalem, then the United States should honor that. How would we like it if some other nation said "We decided to recognize New York City as your capital instead, so we will build our embassy there?" said Paul. Despite media claims, Ron Paul is not anti-Israel, but anti-intervention is the affairs of a sovereign nation.
Newborn Girl Rescued from Toilet in China
Bruce Walker - The New American
Cao Qulin went into labor last Saturday, which was nine days before her due date. She went to the toilet before reaching the hospital and, unexpectedly, gave birth into the toilet. Her husband called the police. The Chouyang Fire Brigade explained what happened next. "The rescuers could see the baby and hear her crying sometimes in the pit. They broke the pits by hand so they could reach the baby without endangering her." The baby has been released from the hospital and is in good condition now.
The prevalence of gender-specific abortions in China (as well as in other Asian nations) makes the survival of this baby girl even more miraculous. In China, however, and in other
nations in which boys are considered more valuable than girls, parents disproportionately choose a boy as their first child. And this is made more pronounced by the "one child" policy in China. In some Chinese provinces, the ratio of births is seriously unbalanced: 130 boys born for every 100 girls born in Henan and Hainan, for example. This has resulted in about 32 million more males under the age of 20 in China than girls 20 or younger.
Cao Qulin, when her newborn girl went into the toilet, reacted like any good mother, and this tiny new soul in our world is blessed to have parents who view her as a blessing, regardless of gender. The tragic gendercide of millions of other unborn girls, however, continues, helped by those feminists who view a "woman's right to choose" above a "girl's right to live."
Northern Sudan Plans Ethnic Cleansing
The country of Northern Sudan has vowed to remove all southerners from the nation and has set April 8th as the deadline for them to leave. The president of Northern Sudan considers all non-Arabs as "southerners", even if they have lived in the north for generations. A year ago, he told the British newspaper The Guardian, "If south Sudan secedes, we will change the constitution, and at that time there will be no time to speak of diversity of culture and ethnicity. … Sharia and Islam will be the main source for the constitution, Islam the official religion and Arabic the official language." If the president has his way, 700,000 refugees will have to flee Northern Sudan.
North American Union Moves Closer After Trilateral Summit
Alex Newman- The New American
President Obama hosted Mexican President Felipe Calderón and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper in Washington, D.C., this week for the so-called "North American Leaders Summit," announcing further integration of the three governments across a broad range of fields. According to statements released after the gathering, Obama and the leaders of Mexico and Canada discussed everything from trade and energy to security, health, and narcotics. All agreed that more integration and trilateral cooperation was needed, supposedly for the benefit of the "peoples" of the region.
Beyond alleged "security" and the steady merging of North America's governments, the three leaders praised a wide array of other integration schemes as well. The joint statement expressed support for a variety of regional initiatives including the Inter-American System, the Summit of the Americas, the Central America Integration System, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the Inter-American Competitiveness Network, the Central American Regional Security Strategy, and more. While the plot to "integrate" North America was once dismissed by some uninformed skeptics as a "conspiracy theory," developments in recent years have shown conclusively that it is neither a conspiracy nor a theory. In fact, the process is now going on largely in the open.
Canada Moves Closer to Cashless Society With Digital MintChip Currency
By Alex Newman
As free market-based digital currencies like Bitcoin and e-gold continue to gain traction around the world, the government of Canada responded with the "MintChip," an electronic payment system touted by authorities as "better than cash" and the "evolution of currency." Critics of the scheme, however, were not so enthusiastic about the accelerating march toward a cashless society.
The Royal Canadian Mint announced the controversial scheme online earlier this month. Essentially, the scheme will allow users to make small transactions using "digital currency" through cell phones and other mobile devices, supposedly anonymously - for now. It will start small, but proponents hope to eventually phase out coins and even small-denomination bills.
Last month, Canada already took a baby step toward eradicating cash by killing the penny. Like in the U.S., the one-cent coin now costs more to produce than its face value. But instead of sparking a much-needed debate about why that is - reckless inflation caused by central bankers - Canadians were prodded into debating whether cash in any denomination should exist at all. Apparently more than half of the population would not mind switching over to digital currency instead.
Of course, as governments and central banks seek to further consolidate control over populations, the market has increasingly developed alternatives to the troubled fiat currencies of the world. Some have been community-based currencies backed by time or the labor of participants in the system. Others involved trading physically and electronically in gold or silver, which historically have always been used as money - at least until recent decades.
And then there have been non-government-approved digital currencies, like the increasingly popular Bitcoin - widely believed to have been a catalyst for the Canadian Mint's own emerging electronic system. But there are some key differences between Bitcoin and Canada's new scheme: For one, Bitcoins are not issued as debt with interest. They are also not backed by the coercive power of a government. And, perhaps most importantly, the supply of Bitcoins is limited, unlike the amount of Canadian fiat dollars and other national currencies.
But market alternatives to monetary matters - not more government edicts and projects - are part of the attraction to the emerging world of non-government electronic currencies. "The point of digital currency, and especially free-market digital currency, is to broaden the avenues for issuance and adoption of alternative nonpolitical monetary units," noted analyst Jon Matonis in a piece for Forbes about the Canadian Mint's scheme. "My objection still lies with the fact that it is a non-free-market approach to the payments issue."
While objections continue to be raised, however, authorities around the world are not backing down. Whether market-based currencies will keep flourishing at the expense of fiat debt-based currencies backed by governments remains unclear. But according to analysts, the establishment will eventually seek to crack down on market money to ensure the perpetuation of its monopoly. And when that happens, physical cash may already be a thing of the past. Will you use the government's chip?
This Article is used by permission and was originally published in The New American Magazine.
© The New American Magazine. All rights reserved.
The World's Fastest Flying Human Beings
Rauma, Norway, is the home of the annual World BASE Race, the ultimate in extreme sports. The contestants, arrayed in super-hero looking wing suits, jump from a precipice measuring 2,500 feet and attempt to free fall faster than their opponent. The athletes are equipped with a parachute but the lower altitudes make the jumps much more dangerous than sky diving. The acronym BASE stands for buildings, antennas, spans and earth. Other base jumps are held on bridges, sky skrapers and various types of antennas but the Norway event is the championship that determines the world's fastest human being. To qualify for the event, the organizers recommend competitors to have completed over 100 BASE jumps and at least 50 wingsuit jumps from a plane. Overall in Norway, there has been one fatality for every 2,317 jumps between 1995 and 2005. Safety is of the utmost concern for the organizers of the Rauma competition. At the bottom of the cliff lies a fjord to provide a water lading for those jumpers who deploy their parachutes too late. So far, there have been no accidents at the championship which has been held since 2008.
Wind and Solar Power Advancements Irrelevant
The Obama administration has increased renewable energy technology that utilizes wind, solar, and geothermal sources by almost 50%. Although this may sound impressive, Keith Hennessy and Lawrence Livermore point out that the increase is quite pathetic in the overall picture. The US is full of cheap coal and natural gas production and the BTUs produced by the renewable energy sources pale in comparison. Without the artificial demand created by government mandates, there would be no reason to develop these technologies in the first place. If sometime in the future these renewable energies were to become cost effective or the market demanded it, then president Obama's technological advances may be somewhat beneficial.
Canada Plans to Raise Retirement Age
In an attempt to reduce their budget deficit, the Canadian government has proposed to raise the retirement age from 65 to 67. Other cuts included plans for the laying off of 19,200 government staff, or 4.8 percent of the federal workforce. Although these cuts are unpopular, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty noted, "Other Western countries face the risk of long-term economic decline. We have a rare opportunity to position our country for sustainable, long-term growth."
Ireland Households Protest New Tax
Protesters filled the streets near the Dublin Convention Centre where Prime Minister Enda Kenny was holding his Fine Gael party. The people are up in arms about the (EURO)100 ($130) per dwelling tax that was a result of austerity measures required by the European Union, and European Central Bank and International Monetary Fund who loaned Ireland a $90 billion credit line to pay its bills back in 2010. Many Irish residents are refusing to pay the tax and only 735,000 households have complied before the deadline.
Iran Nuke Threat Not Imminent, Officials Say
Jack Kenny - The New American
Iran does not have a nuclear bomb, has not decided to build one and is probably years away from having a deliverable nuclear warhead. Those are three things the United States, its European allies, and Israel all agree on, according to a March 23 Reuters report. The report, based on interviews with U.S. and European officials with access to intelligence on nuclear-related activities in Iran, is in marked contrast to much of the talk about Iran's nuclear program, both in the United States, where talk of military action against Iran is often threatened or implied, and in Israel, where a potential preventive strike against Iranian nuclear facilities has been a hot topic of debate.
The report is the latest in a series of defense analyses in recent months that support the findings of a then-controversial National Intelligence Estimate in 2007, based on the investigations of 16 American intelligence agencies, that stated with "high confidence" Iran had halted its nuclear weapons program in the fall of 2003. Iranian officials have maintained that their nuclear program is for medical applications and energy production.
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